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The  Education  of  the 

Child.- 


By 

Ellen  Key 


Reprinted   from   the   authorized   English  translation    of 
"  The  Century  of  the  Child."     With  Introductory 

Note  by 

Edward  Bok 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New    York    and    London 
^be  fcnicKecbockec   press 


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copyright 
By  G.  p.  Putnam's  Sons 

1888 

Entered  at  Stationers'  Hally  Londtn 

By  T.  Fisher  Unwin 


^^"^ 


Made  in  the  United  States  of  America 


INTRODUCTORY  NOTE 

Edward  Bok,  Editor  of  the  ''Ladies'  Home 
Journal^''  writes : 

"  Nothing  finer  on  the  wise  education  of  the 
child  has  ever  been  brought  into  print.  To 
me  this  chapter  is  a  pei-fect  classic ;  it  points 
the  way  straight  for  every  parent  and  it  should 
find  a  place  in  every  home  in  America  where 
there  is  a  child." 


The  Education  of  the  Child 

Goethe  showed  long  ago  in  his  Werther  a 
clear  understanding  of  the  significance  of  in- 
dividualistic and  psychological  training,  an 
appreciation  which  will  mark  the  century  of 
the  child.  In  this  work  he  shows  how  the  fu- 
ture power  of  will  lies  hidden  in  the  character- 
istics of  the  child,  and  how  along  with  every 
fault  of  the  child  an  uncorrupted  germ  capable 
of  producing  good  is  enclosed.  "  Always," 
he  says,  "  I  repeat  the  golden  words  of  the 
teacher  of  mankind,  'if  ye  do  not  become  as 
one  of  these,'  and  now,  good  friend,  those  who 
are  our  equals,  whom  we  should  look  upon  as 
our  models,  we  treat  as  subjects;  they  should 
have  no  will  of  their  own;  do  w^e  have  none? 
Where  is  our  prerogative?  Does  it  consist  in 
the  fact  that  we  are  older  and  more  experi- 
enced? Good  God  of  Heaven!  Thou  seest 
old  and  young  children,  nothing  else.  And  in 
whom  Thou  hast  more  joy.  Thy  Son  announced 
ages  ago.  But  people  believe  in  Him  and  do 
not  hear  Him — that,  too,  is  an  old  trouble. 


2  'The  Century  of  the  Child 

and  they  model  their  children  after  themselves.'* 
The  same  criticism  might  be  applied  to  our 
present  educators,  who  constantly  have  on 
their  tongues  such  words  as  evolution,  indi- 
viduality, and  natural  tendencies,  but  do  not 
heed  the  new  commandments  in  which  they  say 
they  believe.  They  continue  to  educate  as  if 
they  believed  still  in  the  natural  depravity  of 
man,  in  original  sin,  which  may  be  bridled, 
tamed,  suppressed,  but  not  changed.  The  new 
belief  is  really  equivalent  to  Goethe's  thoughts 
given  above,  Le.j,  that  almost  every  fault  is  but 
a  hard  shell  enclosing  the  germ  of  virtue. 
Even  men  of  modern  times  still  follow  in  edu- 
cation the  old  rule  of  medicine,  that  evil  must 
be  driven  out  by  evil,  instead  of  the  new 
method,  the  system  of  allowing  nature  quietly 
and  slow^ly  to  help  itself,  taking  care  only 
that  the  surrounding  conditions  help  the  work 
of  nature.     This  is  education. 

Neither  harsh  nor  tender  parents  suspect  the 
truth  expressed  by  Carlyle  when  he  said  that 
the  marks  of  a  noble  and  original  tempera- 
ment are  wild,  strong  emotions,  that  must  be 
controlled  by  a  discipline  as  hard  as  steel. 
People  either  strive  to  root  out  passions 
altogether,  or  they  abstain  from  teaching  the 
child  to  get  them  under  control. 


The  Education  of  the  Child  3 

To  suppress  the  real  personality  of  the  child, 
and  to  supplant  it  with  another  personality- 
continues  to  be  a  pedagogical  crime  common 
to  those  who  announce  loudly  that  education 
should  only  develop  the  real  individual  nature 
of  the  child. 

They  are  still  not  convinced  that  egoism  on 
the  part  of  the  child  is  justified.  Just  as  little 
are  they  convinced  of  the  possibility  that  evil 
can  be  changed  into  good. 

Education  must  be  based  on  the  certainty 
that  faults  cannot  be  atoned  for,  or  blotted 
out,  but  must  always  have  their  consequences. 
At  the  same  time,  there  is  the  other  certainty, 
that  through  progressive  evolution,  by  slow 
adaptation  to  the  conditions  of  environment 
they  may  be  transformed.  Only  when  this 
stage  is  reached  will  education  begin  to  be  a 
science  and  art.  We  wdll  then  give  up  all  be- 
lief in  the  miraculous  effects  of  sudden  inter- 
ference; we  shall  act  in  the  psychological 
sphere  in  accordance  \\dth  the  principle  of  the 
indestructibility  of  matter.  We  shall  never 
believe  that  a  characteristic  of  the  soul  can  be 
destroyed.  There  are  but  two  j)ossibilities. 
Either  it  can  be  brought  into  subjection  or  it 
can  be  raised  up  to  a  higher  plane. 

Madame  de  Stael's  words  show  much  in- 


4  The  Century  of  the  Child 

sight  when  she  says  that  only  the  people  who 
can  play  with  children  are  able  to  educate 
them.  For  success  in  training  children  the 
first  condition  is  to  become  as  a  child  oneself, 
but  this  means  no  assumed  childishness,  no 
condescending  baby-talk  that  the  child  im- 
mediately sees  through  and  deeply  abhors. 
What  it  does  mean  is  to  be  as  entirely  and 
simply  taken  up  with  the  child  as  the  child 
himself  is  absorbed  by  his  life.  It  means  to 
treat  the  child  as  really  one's  equal,  that  is,  to 
show  him  the  same  consideration,  the  same 
kind  confidence  one  shows  to  an  adult.  It 
means  not  to  influence  the  child  to  be  what  we 
ourselves  desire  him  to  become  but  to  be  in- 
fluenced by  the  impression  of  what  the  child 
himself  is;  not  to  treat  the  child  with  decep- 
tion, or  by  the  exercise  of  force,  but  with  the 
seriousness  and  sincerity  proper  to  his  own 
character. 

Somewhere  Rousseau  says  that  all  education 
has  failed  in  that  nature  does  not  fashion  par- 
ents as  educators  nor  children  for  the  sake  of 
education.  What  would  happen  if  we  finally 
succeeded  in  following  the  directions  of  nature, 
and  recognised  that  the  great  secret  of  educa- 
tion lies  hidden  in  the  maxim,  "  do  not 
educate  "  ? 


The  Education  of  the  Child  5 

Not  leaving  the  child  in  peace  is  the  great- 
est evil  of  present-day  methods  of  training 
children.  Education  is  determined  to  create 
a  beautiful  world  externally  and  internally  in 
which  the  child  can  grow.  To  let  him  move 
about  freely  in  this  world  until  he  comes  into 
contact  with  the  permanent  boundaries  of  an- 
other's right  will  be  the  end  of  the  education 
of  the  future.  Only  then  will  adults  really 
obtain  a  deep  insight  into  the  souls  of  children, 
now  an  almost  inaccessible  kingdom.  For  it 
is  a  natural  instinct  of  self-preservation  which 
causes  the  child  to  bar  the  educator  from  his 
innermost  nature.  There  is  the  person  who 
asks  rude  questions;  for  example,  what  is  the 
child  thinking  about?  a  question  which  almost 
invariably  is  answered  with  a  black  or  a  white 
lie.  The  child  must  protect  himself  from  an 
educator  who  would  master  his  thoughts  and 
inclinations,  or  rudely  handle  them,  who  with- 
out consideration  betrays  or  makes  ridiculous 
his  most  sacred  feelings,  who  exposes  faults 
or  praises  characteristics  before  strangers,  or 
even  uses  an  open-hearted,  confidential  con- 
fession as  an  occasion  for  reproof  at  another 
time. 

The  statement  that  no  human  being  learns 
to  understand  another,  or  at  least  to  be  pa- 


6  The  Century  of  the  Child 

tient  with  another,  is  true  above  all  of  the  in- 
timate relation  of  child  and  parent  in  which, 
understanding,  the  deepest  characteristic  of 
love,  is  almost  always  absent. 

Parents  do  not  see  that  during  the  whole 
life  the  need  of  peace  is  never  greater  than  in 
the  years  of  childhood,  an  inner  peace  under 
all  external  unrest.  The  child  has  to  enter 
into  relations  with  his  own  infinite  world,  to 
conquer  it,  to  make  it  the  object  of  his  dreams. 
But  what  does  he  experience?  Obstacles,  in- 
terference, corrections,  the  whole  livelong 
day.  The  child  is  always  required  to  leave 
something  alone,  or  to  do  something  different, 
to  find  something  different,  or  want  something 
different  from  what  he  does,  or  finds,  or  wants. 
He  is  always  shunted  off  in  another  direction 
from  that  towards  which  his  own  character  is 
leading  him.  All  of  this  is  caused  by  our 
tenderness,  vigilance,  and  zeal,  in  directing, 
advising,  and  helping  the  small  specimen  of 
humanity  to  become  a  complete  example  in  a 
model  series. 

I  have  heard  a  three-year-old  child  char- 
acterised as  "  trying  "  because  he  wanted  to  go 
into  the  woods,  whereas  the  nursemaid  wished 
to  drag  him  into  the  city.  Another  child  of 
six  years  was  disciplined  because  she  had  been 


The  Education  of  the  Child  7 

naughty  to  a  playmate  and  had  called  her  a 
little  pig, — a  natural  appellation  for  one  who 
was  always  dirty.  These  are  typical  ex- 
amples of  how  the  sound  instincts  of  the  child 
are  dulled.  It  was  a  spontaneous  utterance 
of  the  childish  heart  when  a  small  boy,  after 
an  account  of  the  heaven  of  good  children, 
asked  his  mother  whether  she  did  not  believe 
that,  after  he  had  been  good  a  whole  week 
in  heaven,  he  might  be  allowed  to  go  to  hell 
on  Saturday  evening  to  play  with  the  bad  lit- 
tle boys  there. 

The  child  felt  in  its  innermost  consciousness 
that  he  had  a  right  to  be  naughty,  a  funda- 
mental right  which  is  accorded  to  adults;  and 
not  only  to  be  naughty,  but  to  be  naughty  in 
peace,  to  be  left  to  the  dangers  and  joys  of 
naughtiness. 

To  call  forth  from  this  "  un virtue  "  the  com- 
plimentary virtue  is  to  overcome  evil  with 
good.  Otherwise  w^e  overcome  natural 
strength  by  weak  means  and  obtain  artificial 
virtues  which  will  not  stand  the  tests  which 
life  imposes. 

It  seems  simple  enough  when  we  say  that 
we  must  overcome  evil  with  good,  but  practi- 
cally no  process  is  more  involved,  or  more 
tedious,  than  to  find  actual  means  to  accom- 


8  The  Century  of  the  Child 

plish  this  end.  It  is  much  easier  to  say  what 
one  shall  not  do  than  what  one  must  do  to 
change  self-will  into  strength  of  character,  sly- 
ness into  prudence,  the  desire  to  please  into 
amiability,  restlessness  into  personal  initiative. 
It  can  only  be  brought  about  by  recognising 
that  evil,  in  so  far  as  it  is  not  atavistic  or  per- 
verse, is  as  natural  and  indispensable  as  the 
good,  and  that  it  becomes  a  permanent  evil 
only  through  its  one-sided  supremacy. 

The  educator  wants  the  child  to  be  finished 
at  once,  and  perfect.  He  forces  upon  the  child 
an  unnatural  degree  of  self-mastery,  a  devo- 
tion to  duty,  a  sense  of  honour,  habits  that 
adults  get  out  of  with  astonishing  rapidity. 
Where  the  faults  of  children  are  concerned,  at 
home  and  in  school,  we  strain  at  gnats,  while 
children  daily  are  obliged  to  swallow  the  camels 
of  grown  people. 

The  art  of  natural  education  consists  in  ig- 
noring the  faults  of  children  nine  times  out  of 
ten,  in  avoiding  immediate  interference,  which 
is  usually  a  mistake,  and  devoting  one's  whole 
vigilance  to  the  control  of  the  environment  in 
which  the  child  is  growing  up,  to  watching 
the  education  which  is  allowed  to  go  on  by  it- 
self. But  educators  who,  day  in  and  day  out, 
are  consciously  transforming  the  environment 


The  Education  of  the  Child  9 

and  themselves  are  still  a  rare  product.  Most 
people  live  on  the  capital  and  interest  of  an 
education,  which  perhaps  once  made  them 
model  children,  but  has  deprived  them  of  the 
desire  for  educating  themselves.  Only  by 
keeping  oneself  in  constant  process  of  growth, 
under  the  constant  influence  of  the  best  things 
in  one's  own  age,  does  one  become  a  companion 
half-waj^  good  enough  for  one's  children. 

To  bring  up  a  child  means  carrying  one's 
soul  in  one's  hand,  setting  one's  feet  on  a  nar- 
row path;  it  means  never  placing  ourselves  in 
danger  of  meeting  the  cold  look  on  the  part 
of  the  child  that  tells  us  without  words  that  he 
finds  us  insufficient  and  unreliable.  It  means 
the  humble  realisation  of  the  truth  that  the 
ways  of  injuring  the  child  are  infinite,  while 
'  the  ways  of  being  useful  to  him  are  few.  How 
seldom  does  the  educator  remember  that  the 
child,  even  at  four  or  five  years  of  age,  is  mak- 
ing experiments  with  adults,  seeing  through 
them,  with  marvellous  shrewdness  making  his 
own  valuations  and  reacting  sensitively  to  each 
impression.  The  slightest  mistrust,  the  small- 
est unkindness,  the  least  act  of  injustice  or 
contemptuous  ridicule,  leave  wounds  that  last 
for  life  in  the  finely  strung  soul  of  the  child. 


lo  The  Century  of  the  Child 

While  on  the  other  side  unexpected  friendli- 
ness, kind  advances,  just  indignation,  make 
quite  as  deep  an  impression  on  those  senses 
which  people  term  as  soft  as  wax  hut  treat  as 
if  they  were  made  of  cowhide. 

Relatively  most  excellent  was  the  old  edu- 
cation which  consisted  solely  in  keeping  one- 
self whole,  pure,  and  honourable.  For  it  did 
not  at  least  depreciate  personality,  although 
it  did  not  form  it.  It  would  be  well  if  but  a 
hundredth  part  of  the  pains  now  taken  by 
parents  were  given  to  interference  with  the 
life  of  the  child  and  the  rest  of  the  ninety  and 
nine  employed  in  leading,  without  interfer- 
ence, in  acting  as  an  unforeseen,  an  invisible 
providence  through  which  the  child  obtains  ex- 
perience, from  which  he  may  draw  his  own 
conclusions.  The  present  practice  is  to  im- 
press one's  own  discoveries,  opinions,  and  prin- 
ciples on  the  child  by  constantly  directing  his 
actions.  The  last  thing  to  be  realised  by  the 
educator  is  that  he  really  has  before  him  an 
entirely  new  soul,  a  real  self  whose  first  and 
chief  right  is  to  think  over  the  things  with 
which  he  comes  in  contact.  By  a  new  soul  he 
understands  only  a  new  generation  of  an  old 
humanity  to  be  treated  with  a  fresh  dose  of  the 


The  Education  of  the  Child        ii 

old  remedy.  We  teach  the  new  souls  not  to 
steal,  not  to  lie,  to  save  their  clothes,  to  learn 
their  lessons,  to  economise  their  money,  to 
obey  commands,  not  to  contradict  older  peo- 
ple, say  their  prayers,  to  fight  occasionally  in 
order  to  be  strong.  But  who  teaches  the  new 
souls  to  choose  for  themselves  the  path  they 
must  tread?  Who  thinks  that  the  desire  for 
this  path  of  their  own  can  be  so  profound 
that  a  hard  or  even  mild  pressure  towards 
uniformity  can  make  the  whole  of  childhood 
a  torment. 

The  child  comes  into  life  with  the  inherit- 
ance of  the  preceding  members  of  the  race; 
and  this  inheritance  is  modified  by  adaptation 
to  the  environment.  But  the  child  shov/s  also 
individual  variations  from  the  type  of  the 
species,  and  if  his  own  character  is  not  to  dis- 
appear during  the  process  of  adaptation,  all 
self-determined  development  of  energy  must 
be  aided  in  every  way  and  only  indirectly  in- 
fluenced by  the  teacher,  who  should  un- 
derstand how  to  combine  and  emphasise  the 
results  of  this  development. 

Interference  on  the  part  of  the  educator, 
whether  by  force  or  persuasion,  weakens 
this  development  if  it  does  not  destroy  it 
altogether. 


12  The  Century  of  the  Child 

The  habits  of  the  household,  and  the  child's 
habits  in  it  must  be  absolutely  fixed  if  they 
are  to  be  of  any  value.  Amiel  truly  says  that 
habits  are  principles  which  have  become  in- 
stincts, and  have  passed  over  into  flesh  and 
blood.  To  change  habits,  he  continues,  means 
to  attack  life  in  its  very  essence,  for  Uf e  is  only 
a  web  of  habits. 

Why  does  everything  remain  essentially  the 
same  from  generation  to  generation?  Why 
do  highly  civilised  Christian  people  continue 
to  plunder  one  another  and  call  it  exchange, 
to  murder  one  another  en  masse,  and  call  it 
nationalism,  to  oppress  one  another  and  call  it 
statesmanship  ? 

Because  in  every  new  generation  the  im- 
pulses supposed  to  have  been  rooted  out  by 
discipline  in  the  child,  break  forth  again,  when 
the  struggle  for  existence — of  the  individual 
in  society,  of  the  society  in  the  life  of  the  state 
— begins.  These  passions  are  not  transformed 
by  the  prevalent  education  of  the  day,  but  only 
repressed.  Practically  this  is  the  reason  why 
not  a  single  savage  passion  has  been  overcome 
in  humanity.  Perhaps  man-eating  may  be 
mentioned  as  an  exception.  But  what  is  told 
of  European  ship  companies  or  Siberian  pris- 
oners  shows  that  even   this   impulse,   under 


The  Education  of  the  Child         13 

conditions  favourable  to  it,  may  be  revived, 
although  in  the  majority  of  people  a  deep 
physical  antipathy  to  man-eating  is  innate. 
Conscious  incest,  despite  similar  deviations, 
must  also  be  physically  contrary  to  the  ma- 
jority, and  in  a  number  of  women,  modesty — 
the  unity  between  body  and  soul  in  relation  to 
love — is  an  incontestable  provision  of  nature. 
So  too  a  minority  would  find  it  physically  im- 
possible to  murder  or  steal.  With  this  list  I 
have  exhausted  everything  which  mankind, 
since  its  conscious  history  began,  has  really  so 
intimately  acquired  that  the  achievement  is 
passed  on  in  its  flesh  and  blood.  Only  this 
kind  of  conquest  can  really  stand  up  against 
temptation  in  every  form. 

A  deep  physiological  truth  is  hidden  in  the 
use  of  language  when  one  speaks  of  un- 
chained passions;  the  passions,  under  the  pre- 
vailing system  of  education,  are  really  only 
beasts  of  prey  imprisoned  in  cages. 

While  fine  words  are  spoken  about  individ- 
ual development,  children  are  treated  as  if 
their  personality  had  no  purpose  of  its  own, 
as  if  they  were  made  only  for  the  pleasure, 
pride,  and  comfort  of  their  parents;  and  as 
these  aims  are  best  advanced  when  children  be- 
come like  every  one  else,  people  usually  begin 


14  The  Century  of  the  Child 

by  attempting  to  make  them  respectable  and 
useful  members  of  society. 

But  the  only  correct  starting  point,  so  far 
as  a  child's  education  in  becoming  a  social  hu- 
man being  is  concerned,  is  to  treat  him  as  such, 
while  strengthening  his  natural  disposition  to 
become  an  individual  human  being. 

The  new  educator  will,  by  regularly  or- 
dered experience,  teach  the  child  by  degrees 
his  place  in  the  great  orderly  system  of  exist- 
ence; teach  him  his  responsibility  towards  his 
environment.  But  in  other  respects,  none  of 
the  individual  characteristics  of  the  child  ex- 
pressive of  his  life  will  be  suppressed,  so  long 
as  they  do  not  injure  the  child  himself,  or 
others.  The  right  balance  must  be  kept  be- 
tween Spencer's  definition  of  life  as  an  adapta- 
tion to  surrounding  conditions,  and  Nietzsche's 
definition  of  it  as  the  will  to  secure  power. 

In  adaptation,  imitation  certainly  plays  a 
great  role,  but  individual  exercise  of  power 
is  just  as  important.  Through  adaptation  life 
attains  a  fixed  form;  through  exercise  of  power, 
new  factors. 

Thoughtful  people,  as  I  have  already  stated, 
talk  a  good  deal  about  personality.  But  they 
are,  nevertheless,  filled  with  doubts  when  their 
children  are  not  just  like  all  other  children; 


The  Education  of  the  Child         15 

when  they  cannot  show  in  their  offspring  all 
the  ready-made  virtues  required  by  society. 
And  so  they  drill  their  children,  repressing  in 
childhood  the  natural  instincts  which  will  have 
freedom  when  they  are  grown.  People  still 
hardly  realise  how  new  human  beings  are 
formed;  therefore  the  old  types  constantly 
repeat  themselves  in  the  same  circle, — the  fine 
young  men,  the  sweet  girls,  the  respectable 
officials,  and  so  on.  And  new  types  with 
higher  ideals, — travellers  on  unkno^Ti  paths, 
thinkers  of  yet  unthought  thoughts,  people 
capable  of  the  crime  of  inaugurating  new 
ways, — such  types  rarely  come  into  existence 
among  those  who  are  well  brought  up. 

Nature  herself,  it  is  true,  repeats  the  main 
types  constantly.  But  she  also  constantly 
makes  small  deviations.  In  this  way  different 
species,  even  of  the  human  race,  have  come 
into  existence.  But  man  himself  does  not  yet 
see  the  significance  of  this  natural  law  in  his 
own  higher  development.  He  wants  the  feel- 
ings, thoughts,  and  judgments  already  stamped 
with  approval  to  be  reproduced  by  each  new 
generation.  So  we  get  no  new  individuals, 
but  only  more  or  less  prudent,  stupid,  amiable, 
or  bad-tempered  examples  of  the  genus 
man.      The     still     living     instincts     of     the 


i6  The  Century  of  the  Child 

ape,  double,  in  the  case  of  man,  the  effect 
of  heredity.  Conservatism  is  for  the  present 
stronger  in  mankind  than  the  effort  to  pro- 
duce new  types.  But  this  last  characteristic 
is  the  most  valuable.  The  educator  should  do 
anything  but  advise  the  child  to  do  what  every- 
body does.  He  should  rather  rejoice  when  he 
sees  in  the  child  tendencies  to  deviation. 
Using  other  people's  opinion  as  a  standard  re- 
sults in  subordinating  one's  self  to  their 
will.  So  we  become  a  part  of  the  great  mass, 
led  by  the  Superman  through  the  strength  of 
his  will,  a  will  which  could  not  have  mastered 
strong  personalities.  It  has  been  justly  re- 
marked that  individual  peoples,  like  the  Eng- 
lish, have  attained  the  greatest  political  and 
social  freedom,  because  the  personal  feeling  of 
independence  is  far  in  excess  of  freedom  in  a 
legal  form.  Accordingly  legal  freedom  has 
been  constantly  growing. 

For  the  progress  of  the  whole  of  the  species, 
as  well  as  of  society,  it  is  essential  that  educa- 
tion shall  awake  the  feeling  of  independence; 
it  should  invigorate  and  favour  the  disposition 
to  deviate  from  the  type  in  those  cases  where 
the  rights  of  others  are  not  affected,  or  where 
deviation  is  not  simply  the  result  of  the  desire 
to  draw  attention  to  oneself.  The  child  should 


The  Education  of  the  Child         17 

be  given  the  chance  to  declare  conscientiously 
his  independence  of  a  customary  usage,  of  an 
ordinary  feeling,  for  this  is  the  foundation  of 
the  education  of  an  individual,  as  well  as  the 
basis  of  a  collective  conscience,  v^hicli  is  the  only 
kind  of  conscience  men  now  have.  What  does 
having  an  individual  conscience  mean?  It 
means  submitting  voluntarily  to  an  external 
law,  attested  and  found  good  by  my  ow^n  con- 
science. It  means  unconditionally  heeding 
the  unwritten  law,  which  I  lay  upon  myself, 
and  following  this  inner  law  even  when  I  must 
stand  alone  against  the  whole  world. 

It  is  a  frequent  phenomenon,  we  can  al- 
most call  it  a  regular  one,  that  it  is  original 
natures,  particularly  talented  beings,  who  are 
badly  treated  at  home  and  in  school.     No  one 
considers  the  sources  of  conduct  in  a  child  who 
shows  fear  or  makes  a  noise,  or  who  is  ab- 
sorbed in  himself,  or  who  has  an  impetuous 
nature.     Mothers  and  teachers  show  in  this 
their  pitiable  incapacity  for  the  most  elemen-j 
tary  part  in  the  art  of  education,  that  is,  to  be  I 
able  to  see  with  their  own  eyes,  not  with  peda-  \ 
gogical  doctrines  in  their  head.  I 

I  naturally  expect  in  the  supporters  of  so- 
ciety, with  their  conventional  morality,  no 
appreciation  of  the  significance  of  the  child's 


i8  The  Century  of  the  Child 

putting  into  exercise  his  own  powers.  Just 
as  little  is  this  to  be  expected  of  those  Christ- 
ian believers  who  think  that  human  nature 
must  be  brought  to  repentance  and  humility, 
and  that  the  sinful  body,  the  unclean  beast, 
must  be  tamed  with  the  rod, — a  theory  which 
the  Bible  is  brought  to  support. 

I  am  only  addressing  people  who  can  think 
new  thoughts  and  consequently  should  cease 
using  old  methods  of  education.  This  class 
may  reply  that  the  new  ideas  in  education 
cannot  be  carried  out.  But  the  obstacle  is 
simply  that  their  new  thoughts  have  not  made 
them  into  new  men;  the  old  man  in  them  has 
neither  repose,  nor  time,  nor  patience,  to  form 
his  own  soul,  and  that  of  the  child,  according 
to  the  new  thoughts. 

Those  who  have  "  tried  Spencer  and  failed," 
because  Spencer's  method  demands  intelli- 
gence and  patience,  contend  that  the  child 
must  be  taught  to  obey,  that  truth  lies  in  the 
old  rule,  "  As  the  twig  is  bent  the  tree  is 
inclined." 

Bent  is  the  appropriate  word,  bent  accord- 
ing to  the  old  ideal  which  extinguishes  person- 
ality, teaches  humility  and  obedience.  But 
the  new  ideal  is  that  man,  to  stand  straight  and 
upright,  must  not  be  bent  at  all,  only  sup- 


The  Education  of  the  Child         19 

ported,  and  so  prevented  from  being  deformed 
by  weakness. 

One  often  finds,  in  the  modern  system  of 
training,  the  crude  desire  for  mastery  still 
alive  and  breaking  out  when  the  child  is  ob- 
stinate. "You  won't!"  say  father  and 
mother ;  "  I  will  teach  you  whether  you  have 
a  will.  I  will  soon  drive  self-will  out  of  you." 
But  nothing  can  be  driven  out  of  the  child;  on 
the  other  hand,  much  can  be  scourged  into  it 
which  should  be  kept  far  away. 

Only  during  the  first  few  years  of  life  is  a 
kind  of  drill  necessary,  as  a  pre-condition  to 
a  higher  training.  The  child  is  then  in  such 
a  high  degree  controlled  by  sensation,  that  a 
slight  physical  pain  or  pleasure  is  often  the 
only  language  he  fully  understands.  Conse- 
quently for  some  children  discipline  is  an  in- 
dispensable means  of  enforcing  the  practice 
of  certain  habits.  For  other  children,  the 
stricter  methods  are  entirely  unnecessary  even 
at  this  early  age,  and  as  soon  as  the  child  can 
remember  a  blow,  he  is  too  old  to  receive  one. 

The  child  must  certainly  learn  obedience, 
and,  besides,  this  obedience  must  be  absolute. 
If  such  obedience  has  become  habitual  from 
the  tenderest  age,  a  look,  a  word,  an  intona- 
tion is  enough  to  keep  the  child  straight.    The 


20  The  Century  of  the  Child 

dissatisfaction  of  those  who  are  bringing  him 
up  can  only  be  made  effective  when  it  falls 
as  a  shadow  in  the  usual  sunny  atmosphere  of 
home.  And  if  people  refrain  from  laying  the 
foundations  of  obedience  while  the  child  is 
small,  and  his  naughtiness  is  entertaining, 
Spencer's  method  undoubtedly  will  be  found 
unsuitable  after  the  child  is  older  and  his  ca- 
price disagreeable. 

With  a  very  small  child,  one  should  not 
argue,  but  act  consistently  and  immediately. 
The  effort  of  training  should  be  directed  at  an 
early  period  to  arrange  the  experiences  in  a 
consistent  whole  of  impressions  according  to 
Rousseau  and  Spencer's  recommendation. 
So  certain  habits  will  become  impressed  in  the 
flesh  and  blood  of  the  child. 

Constant  crying  on  the  part  of  small  child- 
ren must  be  corrected  when  it  has  become  clear 
that  the  crjdng  is  not  caused  by  illness  or  some 
other  discomfort, — discomforts  against  which 
crying  is  the  child's  only  weapon.  Crying  is 
now  ordinarily  corrected  by  blows.  But  this 
does  not  master  the  will  of  the  child,  and  only 
produces  in  his  soul  the  idea  that  older  people 
strike  small  children,  when  small  children  cry. 
This  is  not  an  ethical  idea.  But  when  the  cry- 
ing child  i$  immediately  isolated,  and  it  is 


The  Education  of  the  Child         21 

explained  to  him  at  the  same  time  that  whoever 
annoys  others  must  not  be  with  them;  if  this 
isolation  is  the  absolute  result,  and  cannot 
be  avoided,  in  the  child's  mind  a  basis  is  laid 
for  the  experience  that  one  must  be  alone  when 
one  makes  oneself  unpleasant  or  disagreeable. 
In  both  cases  the  child  is  silenced  by  interfer- 
ing with  his  comfort;  but  one  type  of  discom- 
fort is  the  exercise  of  force  on  his  will;  the 
other  produces  slowly  the  self-mastery  of  the 
will,  and  accomplishes  this  by  a  good  motive. 
One  method  encourages  a  base  emotion,  fear. 
The  other  corrects  the  will  in  a  way  that  com- 
bines it  with  one  of  the  most  important  ex- 
periences of  life.  The  one  punishment  keeps 
the  child  on  the  level  of  the  animal.  The  other 
impresses  upon  him  the  great  principle  of  hu- 
man social  life,  that  when  our  pleasure  causes 
displeasure  to  others,  other  people  hinder  us 
from  following  our  pleasures;  or  withdraw 
themselves  from  the  exercise  of  our  self-will. 
It  is  necessary  that  small  children  should  ac- 
custom themselves  to  good  behaviour  at  table, 
etc.  If  every  time  an  act  of  naughtiness  is 
repeated,  the  child  is  immediately  taken  aw^ay, 
he  will  soon  learn  that  whoever  is  disagreeable 
to  others  must  remain  alone.  Thus  a  right 
application    is    made    of    a    right    principle. 


22  The  Century  of  the  Child 

Small  children,  too,  must  learn  not  to  touch 
what  belongs  to  other  people.  If  every  time 
anything  is  touched  without  permission, 
children  lose  their  freedom  of  action  one  way 
or  another,  they  soon  learn  that  a  condition 
of  their  free  action  is  not  to  injure  others. 

It  is  quite  true,  as  a  young  mother  re- 
marked, that  empty  Japanese  rooms  are  ideal 
places  in  which  to  bring  up  children.  Our 
modern  crowded  rooms  are,  so  far  as  child- 
ren are  concerned,  to  be  condemned.  During 
the  year  in  which  the  real  education  of  the 
child  is  proceeding  by  touching,  tasting,  biting, 
feeling,  and  so  on,  every  moment  he  is 
hearing  the  cry,  "  Let  it  alone."  For  the  tem- 
perament of  the  child  as  well  as  for  the  develop- 
ment of  his  powers,  the  best  thing  is  a  large, 
light  nursery,  adorned  with  handsome  litho- 
graphs, wood-cuts,  and  so  on,  provided  with 
some  simple  furniture,  where  he  may  enjoy 
the  fullest  freedom  of  movement.  But  if  the 
child  is  there  with  his  parents  and  is  disobedi- 
ent, a  momentary  reprimand  is  the  best  means 
to  teach  him  to  reverence  the  greater  world  in 
which  the  will  of  others  prevails,  the  world  in 
which  the  child  certainly  can  make  a  place  for 
himself  but  must  also  learn  that  every  place 
occupied  by  him  has  its  limits. 


The  Education  of  the  Child        23 

If  it  is  a  case  of  a  danger,  which  it  is  desir- 
able that  the  child  should  really  dread,  we  must 
allow  the  thing  itself  to  have  an  alarming  in- 
fluence. When  a  mother  strikes  a  child  be- 
cause he  touches  the  light,  the  result  is  that  he 
does  this  again  when  the  mother  is  away.  But 
let  him  burn  himself  with  the  light,  then  he  is 
certain  to  leave  it  alone.  In  riper  years  when 
a  boy  misuses  a  knife,  a  toy,  or  something  simi- 
lar, the  loss  of  the  object  for  the  time  being 
must  be  the  punishment.  Most  boys  would 
prefer  corporal  punishment  to  the  loss  of  their 
favourite  possession.  But  only  the  loss  of  it 
will  be  a  real  education  through  experience  of 
one  of  the  inevitable  rules  of  life,  an  experience 
which  cannot  be  too  strongly  impressed. 

We  hear  parents  who  have  begun  with 
Spencer  and  then  have  taken  to  corporal  pun- 
ishment declare  that  when  children  are  too 
small  to  repair  the  clothing  which  they  have 
torn  there  must  be  some  other  kind  of  punish- 
ment. But  at  that  age  they  should  not  be  pun- 
ished at  all  for  such  things.  They  should  have 
such  simple  and  strong  clothes  that  they  can 
play  freely  in  them.  Later  on,  when  they  can 
be  really  careful,  the  natural  punishment 
would  be  to  have  the  child  remain  at  home  if 
he  is  careless,  has  spotted  his  clothes,  or  torn 


i\ 


24  The  Century  of  the  Child 

them.  He  must  be  shoTvn  that  he  must  help 
to  put  his  clothes  in  good  condition  again,  or 
that  he  will  be  compelled  to  buy  what  he  has 
destroyed  carelessly  with  money  earned  by  him- 
self. If  the  cliild  is  not  careful,  he  must  stay 
at  home,  when  ordinarily  allowed  to  go  out, 
or  eat  alone  if  he  is  too  late  for  meals.  It  may 
be  said  that  there  are  simple  means  by  which 
all  the  important  habits  of  social  Ufe  may  be- 
come a  second  nature.  Eut  it  is  not  possible 
in  all  cases  to  apply  Spencer's  method.  The 
natural  consequences  occasionally  endanger 
the  health  of  the  child,  or  sometimes  are  too 
slow  in  their  action.  If  it  seems  necessary  to 
interfere  directly,  such  action  must  be  con- 
sistent, quick,  and  inmiutable.  How  is  it  that 
the  child  learns  ver}^  soon  that  fire  burns? 
Because  fire  does  so  always.  But  the  mother 
who  at  one  time  strikes,  at  another  threatens, 
at  another  bribes  the  child,  first  forbids  and 
then  immediately  after  permits  some  action; 
who  does  not  carr^^  out  her  threat,  does  not 
compel  obedience,  but  constantly  gabbles  and 
scolds;  who  sometimes  acts  in  one  way  and 
just  as  often  in  another,  has  not  learned  the 
effective  educational  methods  of  the  fire. 

The  old-fashioned  strict  training  that  in  its 
crude  way  gave  to  the  character  a  fixed  type 


The  Education  of  the  Child         25 

rested  on  its  consistent  qualities.  It  was  con- 
sistently strict,  not  as  at  present  a  lax  hesita- 
tion between  all  kinds  of  pedagogical  methods 
and  psychological  opinions,  in  which  the  child 
is  thrown  about  here  and  there  like  a  ball,  in 
the  hands  of  grown  people ;  at  one  time  pushed 
forward,  then  laughed  at,  then  pushed  aside, 
only  to  be  brought  back  again,  kissed  till  it 
is  disgusted,  first  ordered  about,  and  then 
coaxed.  A  grown  man  would  become  insane 
if  joking  Titans  treated  him  for  a  single  day 
as  a  child  is  treated  for  a  year.  A  child 
should  not  be  ordered  about,  but  should  be 
just  as  courteously  addressed  as  a  grown  per- 
son in  order  that  he  may  learn  courtesy.  A 
child  should  never  be  pushed  into  notice,  never 
compelled  to  endure  caresses,  never  over- 
whelmed with  kisses,  which  ordinarily  tor- 
ment him  and  are  often  the  cause  of  sexual 
hyper^esthesia.  The  child's  demonstrations  of 
affection  should  be  reciprocated  when  they 
are  sincere,  but  one's  own  demonstrations 
should  be  reserved  for  special  occasions.  This 
is  one  of  the  many  excellent  maxims  of 
training  that  are  disregarded.  Nor  should 
the  child  be  forced  to  express  regret  in  begging 
pardon  and  the  like.  This  is  excellent  train- 
ing for  hypocrisy.     A  small  child  once  had 


26  The  Century  of  the  Child 

been  rude  to  his  elder  brother  and  was  placed 
upon  a  chair  to  repent  his  fault.  When  the 
mother  after  a  time  asked  if  he  was  sorry,  he 
answered,  "  Yes,"  with  emphasis,  but  as  the 
mother  saw  a  mutinous  sparkle  in  his  eyes  she 
felt  impelled  to  ask,  "  Sorry  for  what? "  and 
the  youngster  broke  out,  "  Sorry  that  I  did 
not  call  him  a  liar  besides."  The  mother  was 
wise  enough  on  this  occasion,  and  ever  after, 
to  give  up  insisting  on  repentance. 

Spontaneous  penitence  is  full  of  signifi- 
cance; it  is  a  deeply  felt  desire  for  pardon. 
But  an  artificial  emotion  is  always  and  every- 
where worthless.  Are  you  not  sorry?  Does 
it  make  no  difference  to  you  that  your  mother 
is  ill,  your  brother  dead,  your  father  away 
from  home?  Such  expressions  are  often  used 
as  an  appeal  to  the  emotions  of  children.  But 
children  have  a  right  to  have  feelings,  or  not 
have  them,  and  to  have  them  as  undisturbed  as 
grown  people.  The  same  holds  good  of  their 
sympathies  and  antipathies.  The  sensitive 
feelings  of  children  are  constantly  injured  by 
lack  of  consideration  on  the  part  of  grown  peo- 
ple, their  easily  stimulated  aversions  are  con- 
stantly being  brought  out.  But  the  sufferings 
of  children  through  the  crudeness  of  their 
elders  belong  to  an  unwritten  chapter  of  child 


The  Education  of  the  Child        27 

psychology.  Just  as  there  are  few  better 
methods  of  training  than  to  ask  children,  when 
they  have  behaved  unjustly  to  others,  to  con- 
sider whether  it  would  be  pleasant  for  them 
to  be  treated  in  that  way,  so  there  is  no  better 
corrective  for  the  trainer  of  children  than  the 
habit  of  asking  oneself,  in  question  small  and 
great, — Would  I  consent  to  be  treated  as  I 
have  just  treated  my  child?  If  it  were  only 
remembered  that  the  child  generally  suffers 
double  as  much  as  the  adult,  parents  would 
perhaps  learn  physical  and  psychical  tender- 
ness without  which  a  child's  life  is  a  constant 
torment. 

As  to  presents,  the  same  principle  holds 
good  as  with  emotions  and  marks  of  tender- 
ness. Onl}'^  by  example  can  generous  instincts 
be  provoked.  Above  all  the  child  should  not 
be  allowed  to  have  things  which  he  immediately 
gives  away.  Gifts  to  a  child  should  always 
imply  a  personal  requital  for  work  or  sacrifice. 
In  order  to  secure  for  children  the  pleasure  of 
giving  and  the  opportunity  of  obtaining  small 
pleasures  and  enjoyments,  as  well  as  of  re- 
placing property  of  their  own  or  of  others 
which  they  may  have  destroyed,  they  should  at 
an  early  age  be  accustomed  to  perform  seri- 
ously certain  household  duties  for  which  they 


28  The  Century  of  the  Child 

receive  some  small  remuneration.  But  small 
occasional  services,  whether  volunteered  or 
asked  for  by  others,  should  never  be  rewarded. 
Only  readiness  to  serve,  without  payment,  de- 
velops the  joy  of  generosity.  When  the  child 
wants  to  give  away  something,  people  should 
not  make  a  pretence  of  receiving  it.  This 
produces  the  false  conception  in  his  mind  that 
the  pleasure  of  being  generous  can  be  had  for 
nothing.  At  every  step  the  child  should  be 
allowed  to  meet  the  real  experiences  of  life; 
the  thorns  should  never  be  plucked  from  his 
roses.  This  is  what  is  least  understood  in 
present-day  training.  Thus  we  see  reasonable 
methods  constantly  failing.  People  find 
themselves  forced  to  "  afflictive "  methods 
which  stand  in  no  relation  with  the  realities  of 
life.  1  mean,  above  all,  what  are  still  called 
means  of  education,  instead  of  means  of  tor- 
ture,— blows. 

Many  people  of  to-day  defend  blows,  main- 
taining that  they  are  milder  means  of  punish- 
ment than  the  natural  consequences  of  an 
act;  that  blows  have  the  strongest  effect  on 
the  memory,  which  effect  becomes  permanent 
through  association  of  ideas. 

But  what  kinds  of  association?  Is  it  not 
with  physical  pain  and  shame  ?  Gradually,  step 


The  Education  of  the  Child         29 

by  step,  this  method  of  training  and  discipline 
has  been  superseded  in  all  its  forms.  The 
movement  to  abolish  torture,  imprisonment, 
and  corporal  punishment  failed  for  a  long  time 
owing  to  the  conviction  that  they  were  indis- 
pensable as  methods  of  discipline.  But  the 
child,  people  answer,  is  still  an  animal,  he  must 
be  brought  up  as  an  animal.  Those  who  talk 
in  this  way  know  nothing  of  children  nor  of 
animals.  Even  animals  can  be  trained  with- 
out striking  them,  but  they  can  only  be  trained 
by  men  w^ho  have  become  men  themselves. 

Others  come  forward  with  the  doctrine  that 
terror  and  pain  have  been  the  best  means  of 
educating  mankind,  so  the  child  must  pursue 
the  same  road  as  humanity.  This  is  an  utter 
absurdity.  We  should  also,  on  this  theory, 
teach  our  children,  as  a  natural  introduction 
to  religion,  to  practise  fetish  w^orship.  If 
the  child  is  to  reproduce  all  the  lower  de- 
velopment stages  of  the  race,  he  would  be 
practically  depressed  beneath  the  level  which 
he  has  reached  physiologically  and  psycho- 
logically through  the  common  inheritance 
of  the  race.  If  we  have  abandoned  torture 
and  painful  punishments  for  adults,  w^hile 
they  are  retained  for  children,  it  is  because  we 
have  not  yet  seen  that  their  soul  life  so  far  as 


30  The  Century  of  the  Child 

a  greater  and  more  subtle  capacity  for  suffer- 
ing is  concerned  has  made  the  same  progress 
as  that  of  adult  mankind.  The  numerous 
cases  of  child  suicide  in  the  last  decade  were 
often  the  result  of  fear  of  corporal  punishment ; 
or  have  taken  place  after  its  administration. 
Both  soul  and  body  are  equally  affected  by 
this  practice.  Where  this  is  not  the  result, 
blows  have  even  more  dangerous  consequences. 
They  tend  to  dull  still  further  the  feeling  of 
shame,  to  increase  the  brutality  or  cowardice 
of  the  person  punished.  I  once  heard  a  child 
pointed  out  in  a  school  as  being  so  unruly 
that  it  was  generally  agreed  he  would  be  bene- 
fited by  a  flogging.  Then  it  w^as  discovered 
that  his  father's  flogging  at  home  had  made 
him  what  he  was.  If  statistics  were  prepared 
of  ruined  sons,  those  who  had  been  flogged 
would  certainly  be  more  numerous  than  those 
who  had  been  pampered. 

Society  has  gradually  given  up  employing 
retributive  punishments  because  people  have 
seen  that  they  neither  awaken  the  feeling  of 
guilt,  nor  act  as  a  deterrent,  but  on  the  contrary 
retribution  applied  by  equal  to  equal  brutal- 
ises  the  ideas  of  right,  hardens  the  temper,  and 
stimulates  the  victim  to  exercise  the  same  vio- 
lence towards  others  that  has  been  endured 


The  Education  of  the  Child        31 

by  himself.  But  other  rules  are  applied  to  the 
psychological  processes  of  the  child.  When 
a  child  strikes  his  small  sister  the  mother 
strikes  him  and  believes  that  he  will  see  and 
understand  the  difference  between  the  blows 
he  gets  and  those  he  gives ;  that  he  will  see  that 
the  one  is  a  just  punishment  and  the  other 
vicious  conduct.  But  the  child  is  a  sharp 
logician  and  feels  that  the  action  is  just  the 
same,  although  the  mother  gives  it  a  different 
name. 

Corporal  punishment  was  long  ago  admir- 
ably described  by  Comenius,  who  compared 
an  educator  using  this  method  with  a  musician 
striking  a  badly  tuned  instrument  with  his 
fist,  instead  of  using  his  ears  and  his  hands  to 
put  it  into  tune. 

These  brutal  attacks  work  on  the  active  sen- 
sitive feelings,  lacerating  and  confusing  them. 
They  have  no  educative  power  on  all  the  in- 
numerable fine  processes  in  the  life  of  the 
child's  soul,  on  their  obscurely  related  com- 
binations. 

In  order  to  give  real  training,  the  first  thing 
after  the  second  or  third  year  is  to  abandon 
the  very  thought  of  a  blow  among  the  possi- 
bilities of  education.  It  is  best  if  parents,  as 
soon  as  the  child  is  born,  agree  never  to  strike 


32  The  Century  of  the  Child 

him,  for  if  they  once  begin  with  this  con- 
venient and  easy  method,  they  continue  to  use 
corporal  discipline  even  contrary  to  their  first 
intention,  because  they  have  failed  while  using 
such  punishment  to  develop  the  child's  in- 
telligence. 

If  people  do  not  see  this  it  is  no  more  use  to 
speak  to  them  of  education  than  it  would  be 
to  talk  to  a  cannibal  about  the  world's  peace. 

But  as  these  savages  in  educational  matters 
are  often  civilised  human  beings  in  other  re- 
spects, I  should  like  to  request  them  to  think 
over  the  development  of  marriage  from  the 
time  when  man  wooed  with  a  club  and  when 
woman  was  regarded  as  the  soulless  property 
of  man,  only  to  be  kept  in  order  by  blows,  a 
view  which  continued  to  be  held  until  modern 
times.  Through  a  thousand  daily  secret  in- 
fluences, our  feelings  and  ideas  have  been  so 
transformed  that  these  crude  conceptions  have 
disappeared,  to  the  great  advantage  of  society 
and  the  individual.  But  it  may  be  hard  to 
awaken  a  pedagogical  savage  to  the  convic- 
tion that,  in  quite  the  same  way,  a  thousand 
new  secret  and  mighty  influences  will  change 
our  crude  methods  of  education,  when  parents 
once  come  to  see  that  parenthood  must  go 
through  the  same  transformation  as  marriage, 


The  Education  of  the  Child        33 

before  it  attains  to  a  noble  and  complete 
development. 

Only  when  men  realise  that  whipping  a 
child  belongs  to  the  same  low  stage  of  civilisa- 
tion as  beating  a  woman,  or  a  servant,  or  as 
the  corporal  punishment  of  soldiers  and  crimi- 
nals, will  the  first  real  preparation  begin  of  the 
material  from  which  perhaps  later  an  educator 
may  be  formed. 

Corporal  punishment  w^as  natural  in  rough 
times.  The  body  is  tangible;  what  affects  io 
has  an  immediate  and  perceptible  result.  The 
heat  of  passion  is  cooled  by  the  blows  it  ad- 
ministers; in  a  certain  stage  of  development 
blows  are  the  natural  expression  of  moral  in- 
dignation, the  direct  method  by  which  the 
moral  will  impresses  itself  on  beings  of  lower 
capacities.  But  it  has  since  been  discovered 
that  the  soul  may  be  impressed  b}^  spiritual 
means,  and  that  blows  are  just  as  demoralising 
for  the  one  who  gives  them  as  for  the  one  who 
receives  them. 

The  educator,  too,  is  apt  to  forget  that  the 
child  in  many  cases  has  as  few  moral  concep- 
tions as  the  animal  or  the  savage.  To  punish 
for  this — is  only  a  cruelty,  and  to  punish  by 
brutal  methods  is  a  piece  of  stupidity.  It 
works  against  the  possibility  of  elevating  the 


34  The  Century  of  the  Child 

child  beyond  the  level  of  the  beast  or  the  sav- 
age. The  educator  to  whose  mind  flogging 
never  presents  itself,  even  as  an  occasional  re- 
source, will  naturally  direct  his  whole  thought 
to  finding  psychological  methods  of  education. 
Administering  corporal  punishment  demor- 
alises and  stupefies  the  educator,  for  it  in- 
creases his  thoughtlessness,  not  his  patience, 
his  brutality,  not  his  intelligence. 

A  small  boy  friend  of  mine  when  four  years 
old  received  his  first  punishment  of  this  kind; 
happily  it  was  his  only  one.  As  his  nurse  re- 
minded him  in  the  evening  to  say  his  prayers 
he  broke  out,  "  Yes,  to-night  I  really  have 
something  to  tell  God,"  and  prayed  with  deep 
earnestness,  "  Dear  God,  tear  manmia's  arms 
out  so  that  she  cannot  beat  me  any  more." 

Nothing  would  more  effectively  further  the 
development  of  education  than  for  all  flogging 
pedagogues  to  meet  this  fate.  They  would 
then  learn  16  educate  with  the  head  instead 
of  with  the  hand.  And  as  to  public  educa- 
tors, the  teachers,  their  position  could  be  no 
better  raised  than  by  legally  forbidding  a  blow 
to  be  administered  in  any  school  under  penalty 
of  final  loss  of  position. 

That  people  who  are  in  other  respects  in- 
telligent   and    sensitive    continue    to    defend 


The  Education  of  the  Child        35 

Bogging,  is  due  to  the  fact  that  most  educa- 
tors have  only  a  very  elementary  conception 
of  their  work.  They  should  constantly  keep 
before  them  the  feelings  and  impressions  of 
their  own  childhood  in  dealing  with  children. 
The  most  frequent  as  well  as  the  most  danger- 
ous of  the  numerous  mistakes  made  in  hand- 
ling children  is  that  people  do  not  remember 
how  they  felt  themselves  at  a  similar  age,  that 
they  do  not  regard  and  comprehend  the  feel- 
ings of  the  child  from  their  own  past  point  of 
view.  The  adult  laughs  or  smiles  in  remem- 
bering the  punishments  and  other  things 
which  caused  him  in  his  childhood  anxious 
days  or  nights,  which  produced  the  silent  tor- 
ture of  the  child's  heart,  infinite  despondency, 
burning  indignation,  lonely  fears,  outraged 
sense  of  justice,  the  terrible  creations  of  his 
imagination,  his  absurd  shame,  his  unsatis- 
fied thirst  for  joy,  freedom,  and  tenderness. 
Lacking  these  beneficent  memories,  adults  con- 
stantly repeat  the  crime  of  destroying  the 
childhood  of  the  new  generation, — the  only 
time  in  life  in  w^hich  the  guardian  of  education 
can  really  be  a  kindly  providence.  So  strongly 
do  I  feel  that  the  unnecessary  sufferings  of 
children  are  unnatural  as  well  as  ignoble  that 
I  experience  physical  disgust  in  touching  the 


36  The  Century  of  the  Child 

hand  of  a  human  being  that  I  know  has  struck 
a  child;  and  I  cannot  close  my  eyes  after  I 
have  heard  a  child  in  the  street  threatened  with 
corporal  punishment. 

Blows  call  forth  the  virtues  of  slaves,  not 
those  of  freemen.  As  early  as  Walther  von 
der  Vogelweide,  it  was  known  that  the  hon- 
ourable man  respects  a  word  more  than  a  blow. 
The  exercise  of  physical  force  delivers  the 
weak  and  unprotected  into  the  hands  of  the 
strong.  A  child  never  believes  in  his  heart, 
though  he  may  be  brought  to  acknowledge 
verbally,  that  the  blows  were  due  to  love,  that 
they  were  administered  because  they  were 
necessary.  The  child  is  too  keen  not  to  know 
that  such  a  "  must "  does  not  exist,  and  that 
love  can  express  itself  in  a  better  way. 

Lack  of  self-discipline,  of  intelligence,  of 
patience,  of  personal  effort — ^these  are  the 
corner-stones  on  which  corporal  punishment 
rests.  I  do  not  now  refer  to  the  system  of 
flogging  employed  by  miserable  people  year 
in  and  year  out  at  home,  or,  particularly  in 
schools,  that  of  beating  children  outrageously, 
or  to  the  limits  of  brutality.  I  do  not  mean 
even  the  less  brutal  blows  administered  by  un- 
disciplined teachers  and  parents,  who  avenge 
themselves  in  excesses  of  passion  or  fatigue  or 


The  Education  of  the  Child        37 

disgust, — blows  which  are  simply  the  active 
expression  of  a  tension  of  nerves,  a  detestable 
evidence  of  the  want  of  self -discipline  and  self- 
culture.  Still  less  do  I  refer  to  the  cruelties 
committed  by  monsters,  sexual  perverts,  whose 
brutal  tendencies  are  stimulated  by  their  dis- 
ciplinary power  and  who  use  it  to  force  their 
victims  to  silence,  as  certain  criminal  trials 
have  shown. 

I  am  only  speaking  of  conscientious,  amiable 
parents  and  teachers  who,  with  pain  to  them- 
selves, fulfil  what  they  regard  as  their  duty 
to  the  child.  These  are  accustomed  to  adduce 
the  good  effects  of  corporal  discipline  as  a 
proof  that  it  cannot  be  dispensed  with.  The 
child  by  being  whipped  is,  they  say,  not  only 
made  good  but  freed  from  his  evil  character, 
and  shows  by  his  whole  being  that  this  quick 
and  summary  method  of  punishment  has  done 
more  than  talks,  and  patience,  and  the  slowly 
working  penalties  of  experience.  Examples 
are  adduced  to  prove  that  only  this  kind  of 
punishment  breaks  down  obstinacy,  cures  the 
habit  of  lying  and  the  like.  Those  who  adopt 
this  system  do  not  perceive  that  they  have  only 
succeeded,  through  this  momentarily  effective 
means,  in  repressing  the  external  expression 
of  an  evil  will.     They  have  not  succeeded  in 


38  The  Century  of  the  Child 

transforming  the  will  itself.  It  requires  con- 
stant vigilance,  daily  self -discipline,  to  create 
an  ever  higher  capacity  for  the  discovery  of 
intelligent  methods.  The  fault  that  is  re- 
pressed is  certain  to  appear  on  every  occasion 
when  the  child  dares  to  show  it.  The  educator 
who  finds  in  corporal  punishment  a  short  way 
to  get  rid  of  trouble,  leads  the  child  a  long 
way  round,  if  we  have  the  only  real  develop- 
ment in  view,  namely  that  which  gradually 
strengthens  the  child's  capacity  for  self-con- 
trol. 

I  have  never  heard  a  child  over  three  years 
old  threatened  with  corporal  punishment  with- 
out noticing  that  this  wonderfully  moral 
method  had  an  equally  bad  influence  on  parents 
and  children.  The  same  can  be  said  of  milder 
kinds  of  folly?  coaxing  children  by  external 
rewards.  I  have  seen  some  children  coaxed 
to  take  baths  and  others  compelled  by 
threats.  But  in  neither  case  was  their  cour- 
age, or  self-control,  or  strength  of  will  in- 
creased. Only  when  one  is  able  to  make  the 
bath  itself  attractive  is  that  energy  of  will  de- 
veloped that  gains  a  victory  over  the  feeling 
of  fear  or  discomfort  and  produces  a  real  ethi- 
cal impression,  viz.,  that  virtue  is  its  own  re- 
ward.    Wherever  a  child  is  deterred  from  a 


The  Education  of  the  Child        39 

bad  habit  or  fault  by  corporal  punishment,  a 
real  ethical  result  is  not  reached.  The  child 
has  only  learnt  to  fear  an  unpleasant  conse- 
quence, which  lacks  real  connection  with  the 
thing  itself,  a  consequence  it  well  knows  could 
have  been  absent.  Such  fear  is  as  far  removed 
as  heaven  from  the  conviction  that  the  good  is 
better  than  the  bad.  The  child  soon  becomes 
convinced  that  the  disagreeable  accompani- 
ment is  no  necessary  result  of  the  action,  that 
by  greater  cleverness  the  punishment  might 
have  been  avoided.  Thus  the  physical  pun- 
ishment increases  deception  not  morality.  In 
the  history  of  humanity  the  effect  of  the  teach- 
ing about  hell  and  fear  of  hell  illustrates  the 
sort  of  morality  produced  in  children's  souls 
by  corporal  punishment,  that  inferno  of  child- 
hood. Only  with  the  greatest  trouble,  slowly 
and  unconsciously,  is  the  conviction  of  the  su- 
periority of  the  good  established.  The  good 
comes  to  be  seen  as  more  productive  of  happi- 
ness to  the  individual  himself  and  his  environ- 
ment. So  the  child  learns  to  love  the  good. 
By  teaching  the  child  that  punishment  is  a 
consequence  drawn  upon  oneself  he  learns  to 
avoid  the  cause  of  punishment. 

Despite  all  the  new  talk  of  individuality  the 
greatest  mistake  in  training  children  is  still 


40  The  Century  of  the  Child 

that  of  treating  the  "  child "  as  an  abstract 
conception,  as  an  inorganic  or  personal  ma- 
terial to  be  formed  and  transformed  by  the 
hands  of  those  who  are  educating  him.  He 
is  beaten,  and  it  is  thought  that  the  whole  ef- 
fect of  the  blow  stops  at  the  moment  when  the 
child  is  prevented  from  being  bad.  He  has, 
it  is  thought,  a  powerful  reminder  against  fu- 
ture bad  behaviour.  People  no  not  suspect 
that  this  violent  interference  in  the  physical 
and  psychical  life  of  the  child  may  have  lifelong 
effects.  As  far  back  as  forty  years  ago,  a 
writer  showed  that  corporal  punishment  had 
the  most  powerful  somatic  stimulative  effects. 
The  flagellation  of  the  Middle  Ages  is  known 
to  have  had  such  results ;  and  if  I  could  publish 
what  I  have  heard  from  adults  as  to  the  effect 
of  corporal  punishment  on  them,  or  what  I 
have  observed  in  children,  this  alone  would  be 
decisive  in  doing  away  with  such  punishment 
in  its  crudest  form.  It  very  deeply  influences 
the  personal  modesty  of  the  child.  This  should 
be  preserved  above  everything  as  the  main 
factor  in  the  development  of  the  feeling  of 
purity.  The  father  who  punishes  his  daugh- 
ter in  this  way  deserves  to  see  her  some  day 
a  "  fallen  woman."  He  injures  her  instinc- 
tive feeling  of  the  sanctity  of  her  body,  an  in- 


The  Education  of  the  Child         41 

stinct  which  even  in  the  case  of  a  small  child 
can  be  passionately  profound.  Only  when 
every  infringement  of  sanctity  (forcible  ca- 
ressing is  as  bad  as  a  blow)  evokes  an  ener- 
getic, instinctive  repulsion,  is  the  nature  of  the 
child  proud  and  pure.  Children  who  strike 
back  when  they  are  punished  have  the  most 
promising  characters  of  all. 

Numerous  are  the  cases  in  which  bodily 
punishment  can  occasion  irremediable  damage, 
not  suspected  by  the  person  who  administers 
it,  though  he  may  triumphantly  declare  how 
the  punishment  in  the  specific  case  has  helped. 
]\Iost  adults  feel  free  to  tell  how  a  whipping 
has  injured  them  in  one  way  or  another,  but 
when  they  take  up  the  training  of  their  own 
children  they  depend  on  the  effect  of  such 
chastisement. 

What  burning  bitterness  and  desire  for 
vengeance,  what  canine  fawning  flattery,  does 
not  corporal  punishment  call  forth.  It  makes 
the  lazy  lazier,  the  obstinate  more  obstinate, 
the  hard,  harder.  It  strengthens  those  two 
emotions,  the  root  of  almost  all  evil  in  the 
world,  hatred  and  fear.  And  as  long  as  blows 
are  made  sj^nonymous  with  education,  both  of 
these  emotions  will  keep  their  mastery  over 
men. 


42  The  Century  of  the  Child 

One  of  the  most  frequent  occasions  for  re- 
course to  this  punishment  is  obstinacy,  but 
what  is  called  obstinacy  is  only  fear  or  in- 
capacity. The  child  repeats  a  false  answer, 
is  threatened  with  blows,  and  again  repeats  it 
just  because  he  is  afraid  not  to  say  the  right 
thing.  He  is  struck  and  then  answers  rightly. 
This  is  a  triumph  of  education;  refractoriness 
is  overcome.  But  what  has  happened?  In- 
creased fear  has  led  to  a  strong  effort  of 
thought,  to  a  momentary  increase  of  self-con- 
trol. The  next  day  the  child  will  very  likely 
repeat  the  fault.  Where  there  is  real  obstinacy 
on  the  part  of  children,  I  know  of  cases  when 
corporal  punishment  has  filled  them  with  the 
lust  to  kill,  either  themselves  or  the  person 
who  strikes  them.  On  the  other  hand  I  know 
of  others,  where  a  mother  has  brought  an  ob- 
stinate child  to  repentance  and  self-mastery 
by  holding  him  quietly  and  calmly  on  her 
knees. 

How  many  untrue  confessions  have  been 
forced  by  fear  of  blows;  how  much  daring 
passion  for  action,  spirit  of  adventure,  play 
of  fancy,  and  stimulus  to  discovery  has  been 
repressed  by  this  same  fear.  Even  where 
blows  do  not  cause  lying,  they  always  hinder 
absolute   straightforwardness   and  the  down- 


The  Education  of  the  Child        43 

right  personal  courage  to  show  oneself  as  one  is. 
As  long  as  the  word  "  blow  "  is  used  at  all  in 
a  home,  no  perfect  honour  v/ill  be  found  in 
children.  So  long  as  the  home  and  the  school 
use  this  method  of  education,  brutality  will  be 
developed  in  the  child  himself  at  the  cost  of 
humanity.  The  child  uses  on  animals,  on  his 
young  brothers  and  sisters,  on  his  comrades, 
the  methods  applied  to  himself.  He  puts  in 
practice  the  same  argument,  that  **  badness  " 
must  be  cured  with  blows.  Only  children  ac- 
customed to  be  treated  mildly,  learn  to  see 
that  influence  can  be  gained  without  using 
force.  To  see  this  is  one  of  man's  privileges, 
sacrificed  by  man  through  descending  to  the 
methods  of  the  brute.  Only  by  the  child  see- 
ing his  teacher  alwaj^s  and  everywhere  ab- 
staining from  the  use  of  actual  force,  will  he 
come  himself  to  despise  force  on  all  those  oc- 
casions which  do  not  involve  the  defence  of  a 
weaker  person  against  physical  superiority. 
The  foundation  of  the  desire  for  war  is  to  be 
sought  for  less  in  the  war  games  than  in  the 
teachers'  rod. 

To  defend  corporal  discipline,  children's 
own  statements  are  brought  in  evidence,  they 
are  reported  as  saying  they  knew  they  de- 
served such  discipline  in  order  to  be  made 


44  The  Century  of  the  Child 

good.  There  is  no  lower  example  of  hy- 
pocrisy in  human  nature  than  this.  It  is  true 
the  child  may  be  sincere  in  other  cases  in  say- 
ing that  he  feels  that  through  punishment  he 
has  atoned  for  a  fault  which  was  weighing 
upon  his  conscience.  But  this  is  really  the 
foundation  of  a  false  system  of  ethics,  the 
kind  which  still  continues  to  be  preached  as 
Christian,  namely;  that  a  fault  may  be  atoned 
for  by  sufferings  which  are  not  directly  con- 
nected with  the  fault.  The  basis  of  the  new 
morality  is  just  the  opposite  as  I  have  already 
shown.  It  teaches  that  no  fault  can  be  atoned 
for,  that  no  one  can  escape  the  results  of  his 
actions  in  any  way. 

Untruthfulness  belongs  to  the  faults  which 
the  teacher  thinks  he  must  most  frequently 
punish  with  blow^s.  But  there  is  no  case  in 
which  this  method  is  more  dangerous. 

When  the  much-needed  guide-book  for  par- 
ents is  published,  the  well-known  story  of 
George  Washington  and  the  hatchet  must  ap- 
pear in  it,  accompanied  by  the  remark  which 
a  clever  ten-year-old  child  added  to  the  anec- 
dote: "It  is  no  trouble  telling  the  truth  when 
one  has  such  a  kind  father." 

I  formerly  divided  untruthfulness  into  un- 
willing, shameless,  and  imaginative  lies.      A 


The  Education  of  the  Child         45 

short  time  ago  I  ran  across  a  much  better  divi- 
sion of  lying;  first  "cold"  lies,  that  is,  fully 
conscious  untruthfulness  which  must  be 
punished,  and  "  hot  "  lies;  the  expression  of  an 
excited  temperament  or  of  a  vigorous  fancy. 
I  agree  with  the  author  of  this  distinction  that 
the  last  should  not  be  punished  but  corrected, 
though  not  with  a  pedantic  rule  of  thumb 
measure,  based  on  how  much  it  exceeds  or  falls 
short  of  truth.  It  is  to  be  cured  by  ridicule,  a 
dangerous  method  of  education  in  general,  but 
useful  when  one  observes  that  this  type  of  un- 
truthfulness threatens  to  develop  into  real  un- 
trust worthiness.  In  dealing  wdth  these  faults 
we  are  very  strict  towards  children,  so  strict 
that  no  lawj^er,  no  politician,  no  journalist,  no 
poet,  could  exercise  his  profession  if  the  same 
standard  were  applied  to  them  as  to  children. 
The  white  lie  is,  as  a  French  scientist  has 
shown,  partly  caused  by  pure  morbidness, 
partly  through  some  defect  in  the  conception. 
It  is  due  to  an  empty  space,  a  dead  point  in 
memory,  or  in  consciousness,  that  produces  a 
defective  idea  or  gives  one  no  idea  at  all  of 
what  has  happened.  In  the  affairs  of  every- 
day life  the  adults  are  often  mistaken  as  to 
their  intentions  or  acts.  They  may  have  for- 
gotten about  their  actions,  and  it  requires  a 


46  The  Century  of  the  Child 

strong  effort  of  memory  to  call  them  back  into 
their  minds;  or  they  suggest  to  themselves 
that  they  have  done,  or  not  done,  something. 
In  all  of  these  cases,  if  they  were  forced  to 
give  a  distinct  answer,  they  would  lie.  In 
every  case  of  this  kind,  where  a  child  is  con- 
cerned, the  lie  is  assumed  to  be  a  conscious 
one,  and  when  on  being  submitted  to  a  strict 
cross-examination,  he  hesitates,  becomes  con- 
fused, and  blushes,  it  is  looked  upon  as  a  proof 
that  he  knows  he  has  been  telling  an  untruth, 
although  as  a  rule  there  has  been  no  instance 
of  untruthfulness,  except  the  finally  extorted 
confession  from  the  child  that  he  has  lied.  Yet 
in  all  these  complicated  psychological  prob- 
lems, corporal  punishment  is  treated  as  a 
solution. 

The  child  who  never  hears  lying  at  home, 
who  does  not  see  exaggerated  weight  placed 
on  small,  merely  external  things,  who  is  not 
made  cowardly  by  fear,  who  hears  conscious 
lies  always  spoken  of  with  contempt,  will  get 
out  of  the  habit  of  untruthfulness  simply  by 
psychological  means.  First  he  will  find  that 
untruthfulness  causes  astonishment,  and  a 
repetition  of  it,  scorn  and  lack  of  confidence. 
But  these  methods  should  not  be  applied  to 
imtruthfulness  caused  by  distress  or  by  rich- 


The  Education  of  the  Child        47 

ness  of  imagination;  or  to  such  cases  as  origi- 
nate from  the  obscure  mental  ideas  noted 
above,  ideas  whose  connection  with  one  another 
the  child  cannot  make  clear  to  himself.  The 
cold  untruth  on  the  other  hand,  must  be  pun- 
ished; first  by  going  over  it  with  the  child, 
then  letting  him  experience  its  effect  in  lack 
of  confidence,  which  will  only  be  restored  when 
the  child  shows  decided  improvement  in  this 
regard.  It  is  of  the  greatest  importance  to 
show  children  full  and  unlimited  confidence, 
even  though  one  quietly  maintains  an  attitude 
of  alert  watchfulness;  for  continuous  and  un- 
deserved mistrust  is  just  as  demoralising  as 
blind  and  easy  confidence. 

No  one  who  has  been  beaten  for  lying  learns 
by  it  to  love  truth.  The  accuracy  of  this 
principle  is  illustrated  by  adults  who  despise 
corporal  punishment  in  their  childhood  yet 
continue  to  tell  untruths  by  word  and  deed. 
Fear  may  keep  the  child  from  technical 
untruth,  but  fear  also  produces  untrustworthi- 
ness.  Those  who  have  been  beaten  in  child- 
hood for  lying  have  often  suffered  a  serious 
injury  immeasurably  greater  than  the  direct 
lie.  The  truest  men  I  ever  knew  lie  voluntar- 
ily and  involuntarily;  while  others  who  might 
never  be  caught  in  a  lie  are  thoroughly  false. 


4^  The  Century  of  the  Child 

This  corruption  of  personahty  begins  fre- 
quently at  the  tenderest  age  under  the 
influence  of  early  training.  Children  are 
given  untrue  motives,  half -true  information; 
are  threatened,  admonished.  The  child's  will, 
thought,  and  feeling  are  oppressed;  against 
this  treatment  dishonesty  is  the  readiest  method 
of  defence.  In  this  way  educators  who  make 
truth  their  highest  aim,  make  children  un- 
truthful. I  watched  a  child  who  was  severely 
punished  for  denying  som^ething  he  had  un- 
consciously done,  and  noted  how  under  the 
influence  of  this  senseless  punishment  he  de- 
veloped extreme  dissimulation. 

Truthfulness  requires  above  everything  un- 
broken determination;  and  many  nervous  little 
liars  need  nourishing  food  and  life  in  the  open 
air,  not  blows.  A  great  artist,  one  of  the  few 
who  live  wholly  according  to  the  modern  prin- 
ciples of  life,  said  to  me  on  one  occasion:  "  My 
son  does  not  know  what  a  lie  is,  nor  what  a 
blow  is.  His  step-brother,  on  the  other  hand, 
lied  when  he  came  into  our  house;  but  lying 
did  not  work  in  the  atmosphere  of  calm  and 
freedom.  After  a  year  the  habit  disappeared 
by  itself,  only  because  it  always  met  with  deep 
astonishment." 

This  makes  me,  in  passing,  note  one  of  the 


The  Education  of  the  Child        49 

other  many  mistakes  of  education,  viz.,  the 
infinite  trouble  taken  in  trying  to  do  away  with 
a  fault  which  disappears  by  itself.  People 
take  infinite  pains  to  teach  small  children  to 
speak  distinctly  who,  if  left  to  themselves, 
would  learn  it  by  themselves,  provided  they 
were  always  spoken  to  distinctly.  This  same 
principle  holds  good  of  numerous  other  things, 
in  children's  attitude  and  behaviour,  that  can 
be  left  simply  to  a  good  example  and  to  time. 
One's  influence  should  be  used  in  impressing 
upon  the  child  habits  for  which  a  foundation 
must  be  laid  at  the  very  beginning  of  his 
life. 

There  is  another  still  more  unfortunate  mis- 
take, the  mistake  of  correcting  and  judging 
by  an  external  effect  produced  by  the  act,  by 
the  scandal  it  occasions  in  the  environment. 
Children  are  struck  for  using  oaths  and  im- 
proper words  the  meaning  of  which  they  do  not 
understand;  or  if  they  do  understand,  the  re- 
sult of  strictness  is  only  that  they  go  on  keep- 
ing silence  in  matters  in  which  sincerity 
towards  those  who  are  bringing  them  up  is  of 
the  highest  importance.  The  very  thing  the 
child  is  allowed  to  do  uncorrected  at  home,  is 
not  seldom  corrected  if  it  happens  away  from 
home.    iSo  the  child  gets  a  false  idea  that  it 


so  The  Century  of  the  Child 

is  not  the  thing  that  deserves  punishment,  hut 
its  publicity.  When  a  mother  is  ashamed  of 
the  bad  behaviour  of  her  son  she  is  apt  to  strike 
him — ^instead  of  striking  her  own  breast! 
^  When  an  adventurous  feat  fails  he  is  beaten, 
^  but  he  is  praised  when  successful.  These  prac- 
tices produce  demoralisation.  Once  in  a 
wood  I  saw  two  parents  laughing  while  the 
ice  held  on  which  their  son  was  sliding;  when 
it  broke  suddenly  they  threatened  to  whip  him. 
It  required  strong  self-control  in  order  not  to 
say  to  this  pair  that  it  was  not  the  son  who 
deserved  punishment  but  themselves. 

On  occasions  like  these,  parents  avenge 
their  own  fright  on  their  children.  I  saw  a 
child  become  a  coward  because  an  anxious 
mother  struck  him  every  time  he  fell  down, 
while  the  natural  result  inflicted  on  the  child 
would  have  been  more  than  sufficient  to  in- 
crease his  carefulness.  When  misfortune  is 
caused  by  disobedience,  natural  alarm  is,  as  a 
rule,  enough  to  prevent  a  repetition  of  it.  If 
it  is  not  sufficient  blows  have  no  restraining 
effect;  they  only  embitter.  The  boy  finds  that 
adults  have  forgotten  their  own  period  of 
childhood;  he  withdraws  himself  secretly  from 
this  abuse  of  power,  provided  strict  treat- 
ment does  not  succeed  in  totally  depressing 


The  Education  of  the  Child        51 

the  level  of  the  child's  will  and  obstructing  his 
energies. 

This  is  certainly  a  danger,  but  the  most  seri- 
ous effect  of  corporal  punishment  is  that  it 
has  established  an  unethical  morality  as  its 
result.  Until  the  human  being  has  learnt  to 
see  that  effort,  striving,  development  of 
power,  are  their  own  reward,  life  remains  an 
unbeautiful  affair.  The  debasing  effects  of 
vanity  and  ambition,  the  small  and  great 
cruelties  produced  by  injustice,  are  all  due  to 
the  idea  that  failure  or  success  sets  the  value 
to  deeds  and  actions. 

A  complete  revolution  in  this  crude  theory 
of  value  must  come  about  before  the  earth  can 
become  the  scene  of  a  happy  but  considerate 
development  of  power  on  the  part  of  free  and 
fine  human  beings.  Every  contest  decided 
by  examinations  and  prizes  is  ultimately  an 
immoral  method  of  training.  It  awakens 
only  evil  passions,  envy  and  the  impression  of 
injustice  on  the  one  side,  arrogance  on  the 
other.  After  I  had  during  the  course  of 
twenty  years  fought  these  school  examina- 
tions, I  read  with  thorough  agreement  a  short 
time  ago,  Ruskin's  views  on  the  subject.  He 
believed  that  all  competition  was  a  false  basis 
of  stimulus,  and  every  distribution  of  prizes 


52  The  Century  of  the  Child 

a  false  means.  He  thought  that  the  real  sign 
of  talent  in  a  boy,  auspicious  for  his  future 
career,  was  his  desire  to  work  for  work's  sake. 
He  declared  that  the  real  aim  of  instruction 
should  be  to  show  him  his  own  proper  and 
special  gifts,  to  strengthen  them  in  him,  not 
to  spur  him  on  to  an  empty  competition 
with  those  who  were  plainly  his  superiors  in 
capacity. 

Moreover  it  ought  not  to  be  forgotten  that 
success  and  failure  involve  of  themselves  their 
own  punishment  and  their  own  reward,  the 
one  bitter,  the  other  sweet  enough  to  secure 
in  a  natural  way  increased  strength,  care, 
prudence,  and  endurance.  It  is  completely 
unnecessary  for  the  educator  to  use,  besides 
these,  some  special  punishments  or  special  re- 
wards, and  so  pervert  the  conceptions  of 
the  child  that  failure  seems  to  him  to  be  a 
wrong,  success  on  the  other  hand  as  the 
right. 

No  matter  where  one  turns  one's  gaze,  it  is 
notorious  that  the  externally  encouraging  or 
awe-inspiring  means  of  education,  are  an  ob- 
stacle to  what  are  the  chief  human  character- 
istics, courage  in  oneself  and  goodness  to 
others. 

A  people  whose  education  is  carried  on  by 


The  Education  of  the  Child         53 

gentle  means  only  (I  mean  the  people  of 
Japan),  have  shown  that  manliness  is  not  in 
danger  where  children  are  not  hardened  by 
corporal  punishment.  These  gentle  means 
are  just  as  effective  in  calling  forth  self -mast- 
ery and  consideration.  These  virtues  are  so 
imprinted  on  children,  at  the  tenderest  age, 
that  one  learns  first  in  Japan  what  attraction 
considerate  kindliness  bestows  upon  life.  In 
a  country  where  blows  are  never  seen,  the  first 
rule  of  social  intercourse  is  not  to  cause  dis- 
comfort to  others.  It  is  told  that  when  a 
foreigner  in  Japan  took  up  a  stone  to  throw 
it  at  a  dog,  the  dog  did  not  run.  No  one  had 
ever  thrown  a  stone  at  him.  Tenderness  to- 
wards animals  is  the  complement  in  that  coun- 
try of  tenderness  in  human  relationship,  a 
tenderness  whose  result  is  observed,  among 
other  effects,  in  a  relatively  small  number  of 
crimes  against  life  and  security. 

War,  hunting  for  pleasure,  corporal  disci- 
pline, are  nothing  more  than  different  expres- 
sions of  the  tiger  nature  still  alive  in  man. 
When  the  rod  is  thrown  away,  and  when,  as 
some  one  has  said,  children  are  no  longer  boxed 
on  their  ears  but  are  given  magnifying  glasses 
and  photographic  cameras  to  increase  their 
capacity  for  life  and  for  loving  it,  instead  of 


54  The  Century  of  the  Child 

learning  to  destroy  it,  real  education  In  hu- 
manity will  begin. 

For  the  benefit  of  those  who  are  not  con- 
vinced that  corporal  punishment  can  be  dis- 
pensed with  in  a  manly  education,  by  so  remote 
and  so  distant  an  example  as  Japan,  I  should 
like  to  mention  a  fact  closer  to  us.  Our  Ger- 
manic forefathers  did  not  have  this  method  of 
education.  It  was  introduced  with  Christianity. 
Corporal  discipline  was  turned  into  a  religious 
duty,  and  as  late  as  the  seventeenth  century 
there  were  intelligent  men  who  flogged  their 
children  once  a  week  as  a  part  of  spiritual 
guardianship.  I  once  asked  our  great  poet, 
Victor  Rydberg,  and  he  said  that  he  had  found 
no  proof  that  corporal  punishment  was  usual 
among  the  Germans  in  heathen  times.  I 
asked  him  whether  he  did  not  believe  that  the 
fact  of  its  absence  had  encouraged  the  ener- 
getic individualism  and  manliness  in  the  North- 
ern peoples.  He  thought  so,  and  agreed  with 
me.  Finally,  I  might  note  from  our  own 
time,  that  there  are  many  families  and  schools, 
our  girls'  schools  for  example,  and  also  boys' 
schools  in  some  countries,  where  corporal  pun- 
ishment is  never  used.  I  know  a  family  with 
twelve  children  whose  activity  and  capacity 
are  not  damaged  by  bringing  them  under  the 


The  Education  of  the  Child        55 

rule  of  duty  alone.  Corporal  punishment  is 
never  used  in  this  home ;  a  determined  but  mild 
mother  has  taught  the  children  to  obey  volun- 
tarily, and  has  known  how  to  train  their  wills 
to  self-control. 

By  "voluntary  obedience,"  I  do  not  mean 
that  the  child  is  bound  to  ask  endless  questions 
for  reasons,  and  to  dispute  them  before  he 
obeys.  A  good  teacher  never  gives  a  com- 
mand without  there  being  some  good  reason, 
but  whether  the  child  is  convinced  or  not,  he 
must  always  obey,  and  if  he  asks  "  why  "  the 
answer  is  very  simple;  every  one,  adults  as 
well  as  children,  must  obey  the  right  and  must 
submit  to  what  cannot  be  avoided.  The  great 
necessity  in  life  must  be  imprinted  in  child- 
hood. This  can  be  done  without  harsh  means 
by  training  the  child,  even  previous  to  his 
birth,  by  cultivating  one's  self-control,  and 
after  his  birth  by  never  giving  in  to  a  child's 
caprices. 

The  rule  is,  in  a  few  cases,  to  work  in  op- 
position to  the  action  of  the  child,  but  in  other 
cases  work  constructively;  I  mean  provide  the 
child  with  material  to  construct  his  own  per- 
sonahty  and  then  let  him  do  this  w^ork  of 
construction.  This  is,  in  brief,  the  art  of 
education.     The    worst    of    all    educational 


56  The  Century  of  the  Child 

methods  are  threats.  The  only  effective  ad- 
monitions are  short  and  infrequent  ones.  The 
greatest  skill  in  the  educator  is  to  be  silent 
for  the  moment  and  then  so  reprove  the  fault, 
indirectly,  that  the  child  is  brought  to  correct 
himself  or  make  himself  the  object  of  blame. 
This  can  be  done  by  the  instructor  telling 
something  that  causes  the  child  to  compare  his 
ov/n  conduct  with  the  hateful  or  admirable 
types  of  behaviour  about  which  he  hears  in- 
formation. Or  the  educator  may  give  an 
opinion  which  the  child  must  take  to  himself 
although  it  is  not  applied  directly  to  him. 

On  many  occasions  a  forceful  display  of  in- 
dignation on  the  part  of  the  elder  person  is 
an  excellent  punishment,  if  the  indignation  is 
reserved  for  the  right  moment.  I  know 
children  to  whom  nothing  was  more  frightful 
than  their  father's  scorn;  this  was  dreaded. 
Children  who  are  deluged  with  directions  and 
religious  devotions,  who  receive  an  ounce  of 
morality  in  every  cup  of  joy,  are  most  certain 
to  be  those  who  will  revolt  against  all  this. 
Nearly  every  thinking  person  feels  that  the 
deepest  educational  influences  in  his  life  have 
been  indirect;  some  good  advice  not  given  to 
him  directly;  a  noble  deed  told  without  any 
direct  reference.     But  when  people  come  them- 


The  Education  of  the  Child         57 

selves  to  train  others  they  forget  all  their  own 
personal  experience. 

The  strongest  constructive  factor  in  the 
education  of  a  human  being  is  the  settled,  quiet 
order  of  home,  its  peace,  and  its  duty.  Open- 
heartedness,  industry,  straightforwardness  at 
home  develop  goodness,  desire  to  work,  and 
simplicity  in  the  child.  Examples  of  artistic 
work  and  books  in  the  home,  its  customary  life 
on  ordinary  days  and  holidays,  its  occupa- 
tions and  its  pleasures,  should  give  to  the  emo- 
tions and  imagination  of  the  child,  periods  of 
movement  and  repose,  a  sure  contour  and  a 
rich  colour.  The  pure,  warm,  clear  atmos- 
phere in  which  father,  mother,  and  children 
live  together  in  freedom  and  confidence ;  where 
none  are  kept  isolated  from  the  interests  of  the 
others;  but  each  possesses  full  freedom  for  his 
own  personal  interest;  where  none  trenches  on 
the  rights  of  others;  where  all  are  willing  to 
help  one  another  when  necessary, — in  this  at- 
mosphere egoism,  as  well  as  altruism,  can 
attain  their  richest  development,  and  individu- 
ality find  its  just  freedom.  As  the  evolution 
of  man's  soul  advances  to  undreamed-of  pos- 
sibilities of  refinement,  of  capacity,  of  pro- 
fundity; as  the  spiritual  life  of  the  generation 
becomes   more   manifold  in   its   combinations 


58  The  Century  of  the  Child 

and  in  its  distinctions;  the  more  time  one  has 
for  observing  the  wonderful  and  deep  secrets 
of  existence,  behind  the  visible,  tangible,  world 
of  sense,  the  more  will  each  new  generation  of 
children  show  a  more  refmed  and  a  more  con- 
sistent mental  life.  It  is  impossible  to  attain 
this  result  under  the  torture  of  the  crude 
methods  in  our  present  home  and  school  train- 
ing. We  need  new  homes,  new  schools,  new 
marriages,  new  social  relations,  for  those  new 
souls  who  are  to  feel,  love,  and  suffer,  in  ways 
infinitely  numerous  that  we  now  can  not 
even  name.  Thus  they  will  come  to  un- 
derstand life;  they  will  have  aspirations  and 
hopes;  they  will  believe;  they  will  pray.  The 
conceptions  of  religion,  love,  and  art,  all  these 
must  be  revolutionised  so  radically,  that  one 
now  can  only  surmise  what  new  forms  will  be 
created  in  future  generations.  This  trans- 
formation can  be  helped  by  the  training  of  the 
present,  by  casting  aside  the  withered  foliage 
which  now  covers  the  budding  possibilities  of 
life. 

The  house  must  once  more  become  a  home 
for  the  souls  of  children,  not  for  their  bodies 
alone.  For  such  homes  to  be  formed,  that  in 
their  turn  will  mould  children,  the  children 
must  be  given  back  to  the  home.  Instead  of  the 


The  Education  of  the  Child         59 

study  preparation  at  home  for  the  school  tak- 
ing up,  as  it  now  does,  the  best  part  of  a  child's 
life,  the  school  must  get  the  smaller  part,  the 
home  the  larger  part.  The  home  will  have  the 
responsibility  of  so  using  the  free  time  as  well 
on  ordinary  days  as  on  holidays,  that  the  child- 
ren will  really  become  a  part  of  the  home  both 
in  their  work  and  in  their  pleasures.  The 
children  will  be  taken  from  the  school,  the 
street,  the  factory,  and  restored  to  the  home. 
The  mother  will  be  given  back  from  work 
outside,  or  from  social  life  to  the  children. 
Thus  natural  training  in  the  spirit  of  Rous- 
seau and  Spencer  will  be  realised;  a  training 
for  life,  by  life  at  home. 

Such  was  the  training  of  Old  Scandanavia; 
the  direct  share  of  the  child  in  the  work  of  the 
adult,  in  real  labours  and  dangers,  gave  to  the 
life  of  our  Scandanavian  forefathers  (with 
whom  the  boy  began  to  be  a  man  at  twelve 
years  of  age),  unity,  character,  and  strength. 
Things  specially  made  for  children,  the  anxi- 
ous watching  over  all  their  undertakings,  sup- 
port given  to  all  their  steps,  courses  of  work 
and  pleasure  specially  prepared  for  children, 
— these  are  the  fundamental  defects  of  our 
present  day  education.  An  eighteen-year- 
old  girl  said  to  me  a  short  time  ago,  that  she 


6o  The  Century  of  the  Child 

and  other  girls  of  the  same  age  were  so  tired 
of  the  system  of  vigilance,  protection,  amuse- 
ment, and  pampering  at  school  and  at  home, 
that  they  were  determined  to  bring  up  their 
own  children  in  hunger,  corporal  discipline, 
and  drudgery. 

One  can  understand  this  unfortunate  re- 
action against  an  artificial  environment;  the 
environment  in  which  children  and  young  peo- 
ple of  the  present  grow  up;  an  existence  that 
evokes  a  passionate  desire  for  the  realities  of 
life,  for  individual  action  at  one's  own  risk  and 
responsibility,  instead  of  being,  as  is  now  the 
case,  at  home  and  in  the  school,  the  object  of 
another's  care. 

What  is  required,  above  all,  for  the  children 
of  the  present  day,  is  to  be  assigned  again  real 
home  occupations,  tasks  they  must  do  consci- 
entiously, habits  of  work  arranged  for  week 
days  and  holidays  without  oversight,  in  every 
case  where  the  child  can  help  himself.  In- 
stead of  the  modern  school  child  having  a 
mother  and  servants  about  him  to  get  him 
ready  for  school  and  to  help  him  to  remember 
things,  he  should  have  time  every  day  be- 
fore school  to  arrange  his  room  and  brush  his 
clothes,  and  there  should  be  no  effort  to  make 
bim  remember   what   is   connected   with  the 


The  Education  of  the  Child        6i 

school.  The  home  and  the  school  should  com- 
bine together  systematically  to  let  the  child 
suffer  for  the  results  of  his  own  negligence. 

Just  the  reverse  of  this  system  rules  to-day. 
Mothers  learn  their  children's  lessons,  invent 
plays  for  them,  read  their  story  books  to  them, 
arrange  their  rooms  after  them,  pick  up  what 
they  have  let  fall,  put  in  order  the  things  they 
have  left  in  confusion,  and  in  this  and  in  other 
ways,  by  protective  pampering  and  attention, 
their  desire  for  work,  their  endurance,  the  gifts 
of  invention  and  imagination,  qualities  proper 
to  the  child,  become  weak  and  passive.  The 
home  now  is  only  a  preparation  for  school.  In 
it,  young  people  growing  up,  are  accustomed 
to  receive  services,  without  performing  any  on 
their  part.  They  are  trained  to  be  always  re- 
ceptive instead  of  giving  something  in  return. 
Then  people  are  surprised  at  a  youthful  gen- 
eration, selfish  and  unrestrained,  pressing 
forward  shamelessly  on  all  occasions  before 
their  elders,  crudely  unresponsive  in  respect  of 
those  attentions,  which  in  earlier  generations 
were  a  beautiful  custom  among  the  young. 

To  restore  this  custom,  all  the  means  usu- 
ally adopted  now  to  protect  the  child  from 
physical  and  psychical  dangers  and  incon- 
veniences, will  have  to  be  removed.     Throw 


62  The  Century  of  the  Child 

the  thermometer  out  of  the  window  and  begin 
with  a  sensible  course  of  toughening;  teach  the 
child  to  know  and  to  bear  natural  pain. 
Corporal  punishment  must  be  done  away  with 
not  because  it  is  painful  but  because  it  is  pro- 
foundly immoral  and  hopelessly  unsuitable. 
Repress  the  egoistic  demands  of  the  child  when 
he  interferes  with  the  work  or  rest  of  others; 
never  let  him  either  by  caresses  or  by  nagging 
usurp  the  rights  of  grown  people;  take  care 
that  the  servants  do  not  work  against  what 
the  parents  are  trying  to  insist  on  in  this  and 
in  other  matters. 

We  must  begin  in  doing  for  the  child  in 
certain  ways  a  thousand  times  more  and  in 
others  a  hundred  thousand  times  less.  A  be- 
ginning must  be  made  in  the  tenderest  age 
to  establish  the  child's  feeling  for  nature.  Let 
him  live  year  in  and  year  out  in  the  same  coun- 
try home;  this  is  one  of  the  most  significant 
and  profound  factors  in  training.  It  can  be 
held  to  even  where  it  is  now  neglected.  The 
same  thing  holds  good  of  making  a  choice 
library,  commencing  with  the  first  years  of 
life;  so  that  the  child  will  have,  at  different 
periods  of  his  life,  suitable  books  for  each  age ; 
not  as  is  now  often  the  case,  get  quite  spoilt 
by  the  constant  change  of  summer  excursions, 


The  Education  of  the  Child        63 

by  worthless  children's  books,  and  costly 
toys.  They  should  never  have  any  but  the 
simplest  books;  the  so-called  classical  ones. 
They  should  be  amply  provided  with  means  of 
preparing  their  own  playthings.  The  worst 
feature  of  our  system  are  the  playthings 
which  imitate  the  luxury  of  grown  people. 
By  such  objects  the  covetous  impulse  of  the 
child  for  acquisition  is  increased,  his  own  ca- 
pacity for  discovery  and  imagination  limited, 
or  rather,  it  would  be  limited  if  children  with 
the  sound  instinct  of  preservation,  did  not 
happily  smash  the  perfect  playthings,  which 
give  them  no  creative  opportunity,  and  them- 
selves make  new  playthings  from  fir  cones, 
acorns,  thorns,  and  fragments  of  potter}^  and 
all  other  sorts  of  rubbish  which  can  be  trans- 
formed into  objects  of  great  price  by  the  power 
of  the  imagination. 

To  play  with  children  in  the  right  way  is 
also  a  great  art.  It  should  never  be  done  if 
children  do  not  themselves  know  what  they  are 
going  to  do ;  it  should  always  be  a  special  treat 
for  them  as  well  as  their  elders.  But  the 
adults  must  always  on  such  occasions,  leave 
behind  every  kind  of  educational  idea  and  go 
completely  into  the  child's  world  of  thought 
and    imagination.     No    attempt    should    be 


64  The  Century  of  the  Child 

made  to  teach  them  at  these  tunes  anything 
else  but  the  old  satisfactory  games.  The  ex- 
periences derived  from  these  games  about  the 
nature  of  the  children,  who  are  stimulated  in 
one  direction  or  another  by  the  game,  must  be 
kept  for  later  use. 

Games  in  this  way  increase  confidence  be- 
tween children  and  adults.  They  learn  to 
know  their  elders  better.  But  to  allow  child- 
ren to  turn  all  the  rooms  into  places  to  play 
in,  and  to  demand  constantly  that  their  elders 
shall  interest  themselves  in  them,  is  one  of  the 
most  dangerous  species  of  pampering  common 
to  the  present  day.  The  children  become  ac- 
customed to  selfishness  and  mental  depend- 
ence. Besides  this  constant  educational  effort 
brings  with  it  the  dulling  of  the  child's  per- 
sonality. If  children  were  free  in  their  own 
world,  the  nursery,  but  out  of  it  had  to  sub- 
mit to  the  strict  limits  imposed  by  the  habits, 
wills,  work,  and  repose  of  parents,  their  re- 
quirements and  their  wishes,  they  would  de- 
velop into  a  stronger  and  more  considerate 
race  than  the  youth  of  the  present  day.  It 
is  not  so  much  talking  about  being  considerate, 
but  the  necessity  of  considering  others,  of 
really  helping  oneself  and  others,  that  has  an 
educational  value.     In  earlier  days,  children 


The  Education  of  the  Child        6$ 

were  quiet  as  mice  in  the  presence  of  elder  per- 
sons. Instead  of,  as  they  do  now,  breaking 
into  a  guest's  conversation,  they  learned  to 
listen.  If  the  conversation  of  adults  is  varied, 
this  can  be  called  one  of  the  best  educational 
methods  for  children.  The  ordinary  life  of 
children,  under  the  old  system,  was  lived  in 
the  nursery  where  they  received  their  most  im- 
portant training  from  an  old  faithful  servant 
and  from  one  another.  From  their  parents 
they  received  corporal  punishment,  sometimes 
a  caress.  In  comparison  with  this  system,  the 
present  way  of  parents  and  children  living 
together  would  be  absolute  progress,  if  par- 
ents could  but  abstain  from  explaining,  ad- 
vising, improving,  influencing  every  thought 
and  every  expression.  But  all  spiritual,  men- 
tal, and  bodily  protective  rules  make  the  child 
now  indirectly  selfish,  because  everything 
centres  about  him  and  therefore  he  is  kept  in 
a  constant  state  of  irritation.  The  six-year- 
old  can  disturb  the  conversation  of  the  adult, 
but  the  twelve-3^ear-old  is  sent  to  bed  about 
eight  o'clock,  even  when  he,  with  wide  open- 
eyes,  longs  for  a  conversation  that  might  be 
to  him  an  inspiring  stimulus  for  life. 

Certainly  some  simple  habits  so  far  as  con- 
duct and  order,  nourisliment  and  sleep,  air  and 


66  The  Century  of  the  Child 

water,  clothing  and  bodily  movement,  are  con- 
cerned, can  be  made  the  foundations  for  the 
child's  conceptions  of  morality.  He  cannot  be 
made  to  learn  soon  enough  that  bodily  health 
and  beauty  must  be  regarded  as  high  ethical 
characteristics,  and  that  what  is  injurious  to 
health  and  beauty  must  be  regarded  as  a  hate- 
ful act.  In  this  sphere,  children  must  be  kept 
entirely  independent  of  custom  by  allowing 
the  exception  to  every  rule  to  have  its  valid 
place.  The  present  anxious  solicitude  that 
children  should  eat  when  the  clock  strikes,  that 
they  get  certain  food  at  fixed  meals,  that  they 
be  clothed  according  to  the  degree  of  tempera- 
ture, that  they  go  to  bed  when  the  clock 
strikes,  that  they  be  protected  from  every  drop 
of  unboiled  water  and  every  extra  piece  of 
candy,  this  makes  them  nervous,  irritable 
slaves  of  habit.  A  reasonable  toughening 
process  against  the  inequalities,  discomforts, 
and  chances  of  life,  constitutes  one  of  the  most 
important  bases  of  joy  of  living  and  of 
strength  of  temper.  In  this  case  too,  the  be- 
haviour of  the  person  who  gives  the  training, 
is  the  best  means  of  teaching  children  to  smile 
at  small  contretemps^  things  which  would 
throw  a  cloud  over  the  sun,  if  one  got  into  the 
habit  of  treating  them  as  if  they  were  of  grea^. 


The  Education  of  the  Child        67 

importance.  If  the  child  sees  the  parent  do- 
ing readily  an  unpleasant  duty,  which  he  hon- 
estly recognises  as  unpleasant;  if  he  sees  a 
parent  endure  trouble  or  an  unexpected  diffi- 
culty easily,  he  will  be  in  honour  bound  to  do 
the  like.  Just  as  children  without  many  words 
learn  to  practice  good  deeds  when  they  see 
good  deeds  practised  about  them;  learn  to  en- 
joy the  beauty  of  nature  and  art  when  they 
see  that  adults  enjoy  them,  so  by  living  more 
beautifully,  more  nobly,  more  moderately,  we 
speak  best  to  children.  They  are  just  as 
receptive  to  impressions  of  this  kind  as  they 
are  careless  of  those  made  by  force. 

Since  this  is  my  alpha  and  omega  in  the  art 
of  education,  I  repeat  now  what  I  said  at  the 
beginning  of  this  book  and  half  way  through 
it.  Try  to  leave  the  child  in  peace;  interfere 
directly  as  seldom  as  possible;  keep  away  all 
crude  and  impure  impressions;  but  give  all 
your  care  and  energy  to  see  that  personality, 
life  itself,  reality  in  its  simplicity  and  in  its 
nakedness,  shall  all  be  means  of  training  the 
child. 

Make  demands  on  the  powers  of  children 
and  on  their  capacity  for  self-control,  propor- 
tionate to  the  special  stage  of  their  develop- 
ment, neither  greater  nor  lesser  demands  than 


68  The  Century  of  the  Child 

on  adults.  But  respect  the  joys  of  the  child, 
his  tastes,  work,  and  time,  just  as  you  would 
those  of  an  adult.  Education  will  thus  be- 
come an  infinitely  simple  and  infinitely  harder 
art,  than  the  education  of  the  present  day,  with 
its  artificialised  existence,  its  double  entry 
morality,  one  morality  for  the  child,  and  one 
for  the  adult,  often  strict  for  the  child  and  lax 
for  the  adult  and  vice  versa.  By  treating  the 
child  every  moment  as  one  does  an  adult 
human  being  we  free  education  from  that 
brutal  arbitrariness,  from  those  over-indul- 
gent protective  rules,  which  have  transformed 
him.  Whether  parents  act  as  if  children  existed 
for  their  benefit  alone,  or  whether  the  parents 
give  up  their  whole  lives  to  their  children,  the 
result  is  alike  deplorable.  As  a  rule  both 
classes  know  equally  little  of  the  feelings  and 
needs  of  their  children.  The  one  class  are 
happy  when  the  children  are  like  themselves, 
and  their  highest  ambition  is  to  produce  in  their 
children  a  successful  copj'-  of  their  own 
thoughts,  opinions,  and  ideals.  Really  it 
ought  to  pain  them  very  much  to  see  them- 
selves so  exactly  copied.  What  life  expected 
from  them  and  required  from  them  was  just 
the  opposite — a  richer  combination,  a  better 
creation,  a  new  type,  not  a  reproduction  of 


The  Education  of  the  Child        69 

that  which  is  already  exhausted.  The  other 
class  strive  to  model  their  childen  not 
according  to  themselves  but  according  to  their 
ideal  of  goodness.  They  show  their  love  by 
their  willingness  to  extinguish  their  own  per- 
sonalities for  their  children's  sake.  This  they 
do  by  letting  the  children  feel  that  everything 
which  concerns  them  stands  in  the  foreground. 
This  should  be  so,  but  only  indirectly. 

The  concerns  of  the  whole  scheme  of  life, 
the  ordering  of  the  home,  its  habits,  intercourse, 
purposes,  care  for  the  needs  of  children,  and 
their  sound  development,  must  stand  in  the, 
foreground.  But  at  present,  in  most  cases, 
children  of  tender  years,  as  well  as  those  who 
are  older,  are  sacrificed  to  the  chaotic  con- 
dition of  the  home.  They  learn  self-will  with- 
out possessing  real  freedom;  they  live  under  a 
discipline  which  is  spasmodic  in  its  application. 

'\\Tien  one  daughter  after  another  leaves 
home  in  order  to  make  herself  independent  they 
are  often  driven  to  do  it  by  want  of  freedom, 
or  by  the  lack  of  character  in  family  life.  In 
both  directions  the  girl  sees  herself  forced  to 
become  something  different,  to  hold  different 
opinions,  to  think  different  thoughts,  to  act 
contrarv"  to  the  dictates  of  her  own  being.  A 
mother  happy  in  the  friendship  of  her  own 


70  The  Century  of  the  Child 

daughter,  said  not  long  ago  that  she  desired 
to  erect  an  asylum  for  tormented  daughters. 
Such  an  asylum  would  be  as  necessary  as  a 
protection  against  pampering  parents  as 
against  those  who  are  overbearing.  Both 
alike,  torture  their  children  though  in  different 
ways,  by  not  understanding  the  child's  right 
to  have  his  own  point  of  view,  his  own  ideal  of 
happiness,  his  own  proper  tastes  and  occupa- 
tion. They  do  not  see  that  children  exist  as 
little  for  their  parent's  sake  as  parents  do  for 
their  children's  sake.  Family  life  would  have 
an  intelligent  character  if  each  one  lived  fully 
and  entirely  his  own  life  and  allowed  the  others 
to  do  the  same.  None  should  tyrannise  over, 
nor  should  suffer  tyranny  from,  the  other. 
Parents  who  give  their  home  this  character  can 
justly  demand  that  children  shall  accommodate 
themselves  to  the  habits  of  the  household  as 
long  as  they  live  in  it.  Children  on  their  part 
can  ask  that  their  own  life  of  thought  and  feel- 
ing shall  be  left  in  peace  at  home,  or  that  they 
be  treated  with  the  same  consideration  that 
would  be  given  to  a  stranger.  When  the  par- 
ents do  not  meet  these  conditions  they  them- 
selves are  the  greater  sufferers.  It  is  very 
easy  to  keep  one's  son  from  expressing  his  raw 
views,  very  easy  to  tear  a  daughter  away  from 


The  Education  of  the  Child        71 

her  book  and  to  bring  her  to  a  tea-party 
by  giving  her  unnecessary  occupations;  very 
easy  by  a  scornful  word  to  repress  some  pow- 
erful emotion.  A  thousand  similar  things  oc- 
cur every  day  in  good  families  through  the 
whole  world.  But  whenever  we  hear  of  young 
people  speaking  of  their  intellectual  homeless- 
ness  and  sadness,  we  begin  to  understand  why 
father  and  mother  remain  behind  in  homes 
from  which  the  daughters  have  hastened  to 
depart;  why  children  take  their  cares,  joys, 
and  thoughts  to  strangers ;  why,  in  a  word,  the 
old  and  the  young  generation  are  as  mutually 
dependent  as  the  roots  and  flowers  of  plants, 
so  often  separate  with  mutual  repulsion. 

This  is  as  true  of  highly  cultivated  fathers 
and  mothers  as  of  simple  bourgeois  or  peasant 
parents.  Perhaps,  indeed,  it  may  be  truer  of 
the  first  class ;  the  latter  torment  their  children 
in  a  naive  way,  while  the  former  are  infinitely 
wise  and  methodical  in  their  stupidity.  Rarely 
is  a  mother  of  the  upper  class  one  of  those 
artists  of  home  life  who  through  the  blitheness, 
the  goodness,  and  joyousness  of  her  character, 
makes  the  rhythm  of  everyday  life  a  dance,  and 
holidays  into  festivals.  Such  artists  are  often 
simple  women  who  have  passed  no  examina- 
tions, founded  no  clubs,  and  written  no  books. 


72  The  Century  of  the  Child 

The  highly  cultivated  mothers  and  the  socially 
useful  mothers  on  the  other  hand  are  not  sel- 
dom those  who  call  forth  criticism  from  their 
sons.  It  seems  almost  an  invariable  rule  that 
mothers  should  make  mistakes  when  they  wish 
to  act  for  the  welfare  of  their  sons.  "  How 
infinitely  valuable,"  say  their  children,  "  would 
I  have  found  a  mother  who  could  have  kept 
quiet,  who  would  have  been  patient  with  me, 
who  would  have  given  me  rest,  keeping  the 
outer  world  at  a  distance  from  me,  with 
kindly  soothing  hands.  Oh,  would  that  I  had 
had  a  mother  on  whose  breast  I  could  have 
laid  my  head,  to  be  quiet  and  dream." 

A  distinguished  woman  writer  is  surprised 
that  all  of  her  well-thought-out  plans  for  her 
children  fail — those  children  in  whom  she  saw 
the  material  for  her  passion  for  governing,  the 
clay  that  she  desired  to  mould. 

The  writer  just  cited  says  very  justly  that 
maternal  unselfishness  alone  can  perform  the 
task  of  protecting  a  young  being  with  wisdom 
and  kindliness,  by  allowing  him  to  grow  ac- 
cording to  his  own  laws.  The  unselfish 
mother,  she  says,  will  joyfully  give  the  best  of 
her  life  energy,  powers  of  soul  and  spirit  to 
a  growing  being  and  then  open  all  doors  to 
him,  leaving  him  in  the  broad  world  to  follow 


The  Education  of  the  Child        73 

his  own  paths,  and  ask  for  nothing,  neither 
thanks,  nor  praise,  nor  remembrance.  But 
to  most  mothers  may  be  appHed  the  bit- 
ter exclamation  of  a  son  in  the  book  just  men- 
tioned, "  even  a  mother  must  know  how  she 
tortures  another;  if  she  has  not  this  capacity  by 
nature,  why  in  the  world  should  I  recognise 
her  as  my  mother  at  all." 

Certain  mothers  spend  the  whole  day  in 
keeping  their  children's  nervous  system  in  a 
state  of  irritation.  They  make  work  hard  and 
play  joyless,  whenever  they  take  a  part  in  it. 
At  the  present  time,  too,  the  school  gets  control 
of  the  child,  the  home  loses  all  the  means  by 
which  formerly  it  moulded  the  child's  soul  life 
and  ennobled  family  life.  The  school,  not 
father  and  mother,  teaches  children  to  play, 
the  school  gives  them  manual  training,  the 
school  teaches  them  to  sing,  to  look  at  pictures, 
to  read  aloud,  to  wander  about  out  of  doors; 
schools,  clubs,  sport  and  other  pleasures  ac- 
custom youth  in  the  cities  more  and  more  to 
outside  life,  and  a  daily  recreation  that  kills 
the  true  feeling  for  holiday.  Young  people, 
often,  have  no  other  impression  of  home  than 
that  it  is  a  place  where  they  meet  society  which 
bores  them. 

Parents  surrender  their  children  to  schools 


74  The  Century  of  the  Child 

in  those  years  in  which  they  should  influence 
their  minds.  When  the  school  gives  them 
back  they  do  not  know  how  to  make  a  fresh 
start  with  the  children,  for  they  themselves 
have  ceased  to  be  young. 

But  getting  old  is  no  necessity;  it  is  only  a 
bad  habit.  It  is  very  interesting  to  observe  a 
face  that  is  getting  old.  What  time  makes 
out  of  a  face  shows  better  than  anything  else 
what  the  man  has  made  out  of  time.  Most 
men  in  the  early  period  of  middle  age  are 
neither  intellectually  fat  nor  lean,  they  are 
hardened  or  dried  up.  Naturally  young  peo- 
ple look  upon  them  with  unsympathetic  eyes, 
for  they  feel  that  there  is  such  a  thing  as 
eternal  youth,  which  a  soul  can  win  as  a  prize 
for  its  whole  work  of  inner  development.  But 
they  look  in  vain  for  this  second  eternal  youth 
in  their  elders,  filled  with  worldly  nothing- 
nesses and  things  of  temporary  importance. 

With  a  sigh  they  exclude  the  "  old  people  " 
from  their  future  plans  and  they  go  out  in 
the  world  in  order  to  choose  their  spiritual 
parents. 

This  is  tragic  but  just,  for  if  there  is  a  field 
on  which  man  must  sow  a  hundred-fold  in 
order  to  harvest  tenfold  it  is  the  souls  of 
children. 


The  Education  of  the  Child        75 

When  I  began  at  five  years  of  age  to  make 
a  rag  doll,  that  by  its  weight  and  size  really 
gave  the  illusion  of  reality  and  bestowed  much 
joy  on  its  young  mother,  I  began  to  think 
about  the  education  of  my  future  children. 
Then  as  now  my  educational  ideal  was  that  the 
children  should  be  happy,  that  they  should  not 
fear.  Fear  is  the  misfortune  of  childhood,  and 
the  sufferings  of  the  child  come  from  the  half- 
realised  opposition  between  his  unlimited  pos- 
sibilities of  happiness  and  the  way  in  which 
these  possibilities  are  actually  handled.  It 
may  be  said  that  life,  at  every  stage,  is  cruel 
in  its  treatment  of  our  possibilities  of  happi- 
ness. But  the  difference  between  the  suffer- 
ings of  the  adult  from  existence,  and  the 
sufferings  of  the  child  caused  by  adults,  is 
tremendous.  The  child  is  unwilling  to  resign 
himself  to  the  sufferings  imposed  upon  him  by 
adults  and  the  more  impatient  the  child  is 
against  unnecessary  suffering,  the  better;  for 
so  much  the  more  certainly  will  he  some  day 
be  driven  to  find  means  to  transform  for  him- 
self and  for  others  the  hard  necessities  of  life. 

A  poet,  Rydberg,  in  our  country  who  had 
the  deepest  intuition  into  child's  nature,  and 
therefore  had  the  deepest  reverence  for  it, 
wrote  as  follows :  "  Where  we  behold  children 


76  The  Century  of  the  Child 

we  suspect  there  are  princes,  but  as  to  the 
kings,  where  are  they?  "  Not  only  life's  tragic 
elements  diminish  and  dam  up  its  vital 
energies.  Equally  destructive  is  a  parent's 
want  of  reverence  for  the  sources  of  life  which 
meet  them  in  a  new  being.  Fathers  and  moth- 
ers must  bow  their  heads  in  the  dust  before  the 
exalted  nature  of  the  child.  Until  they  see 
that  the  word  "  child  "  is  only  another  expres- 
sion for  the  conception  of  majesty;  until  they 
feel  that  it  is  the  future  which  in  the  form  of  a 
child  sleeps  in  their  arms,  and  history  which 
plays  at  their  feet,  they  will  not  understand 
that  they  have  as  little  power  or  right  to  pre- 
scribe laws  for  this  new  being  as  they  possess 
the  power  or  might  to  lay  down  paths  for  the 
stars. 

The  mother  should  feel  the  same  reverence 
for  the  unknown  worlds  in  the  wide-open  eyes 
of  her  child,  that  she  has  for  the  worlds  which 
like  white  blossoms  are  sprinkled  over  the  blue 
orb  of  heaven ;  the  father  should  see  in  his  child 
the  king's  son  whom  he  must  serve  humbly 
with  his  own  best  powers,  and  then  the  child 
will  come  to  his  own ;  not  to  the  right  of  asking 
others  to  become  the  plaything  of  his  caprices 
but  to  the  right  of  living  his  full  strong  per- 
sonal child's  life  along  with  a  father  and  a 


The  Education  of  the  Child         77 

mother  who  themselves  live  a  personal  life,  a 
life  from  whose  sources  and  powers  the  child 
can  take  the  elements  he  needs  for  his  own  in- 
dividual growth.  Parents  should  never  ex- 
pect their  own  highest  ideals  to  become  the 
ideals  of  their  child.  The  free-thinking  sons  of 
pious  parents  and  the  Christian  children  of 
freethinkers  have  become  almost  proverbial. 

But  parents  can  live  nobly  and  in  entire  ac- 
cordance to  their  own  ideals  which  is  the  same 
thing  as  making  children  idealists.  This  can 
often  lead  to  a  quite  different  system  of 
thought  from  that  pursued  by  the  parent. 

As  to  ideals,  the  elders  should  here  as  else- 
where, offer  with  timidity  their  advice  and 
their  experience.  Yes  they  should  try  to  let 
the  young  people  search  for  it  as  if  they  were 
seeking  fruit  hidden  under  the  shadow  of 
leaves.  If  their  counsel  is  rejected,  they  must 
show  neither  surprise  nor  lack  of  self-control. 

The  quer}^  of  a  humourist,  why  he  should  do 
anything  for  posterity  since  posterity  had 
done  nothing  for  him,  set  me  to  thinking  in  my 
early  youth  in  the  most  serious  way.  I  felt 
that  posterity  had  done  much  for  its  forefath- 
ers. It  had  given  them  an  infinite  horizon  for 
the  future  beyond  the  bounds  of  their  daily 
effort.     We  must  in  the  child  see  the  new  fate 


7^  The  Century  of  the  Child 

of  the  human  race ;  we  must  carefully  treat  the 
fine  threads  in  the  child's  soul  because  these 
are  the  threads  that  one  day  will  form  the 
woof  of  world  events.  We  must  realise  that 
every  pebble  by  which  one  breaks  into  the 
glassy  depths  of  the  child's  soul  will  extend  its 
influence  through  centuries  and  centuries  in 
ever  widening  circles.  Through  our  fathers, 
Vvithout  our  will  and  without  choice,  we  are 
given  a  destiny  which  controls  the  deepest 
foundation  of  our  own  being.  Through  our 
posterity,  which  we  ourselves  create,  we  can 
in  a  certain  measure,  as  free  beings,  determine 
the  future  destiny  of  the  human  race. 

By  a  realisation  of  all  this  in  an  entirely  new 
v/ay,  by  seeing  the  whole  process  in  the  light 
of  the  religion  of  development,  the  twentieth 
century  will  be  the  century  of  the  child.  This 
will  come  about  in  two  ways.  Adults  will 
first  come  to  an  understanding  of  the  child's 
character  and  then  the  simplicity  of  the  child's 
character  will  be  kept  by  adults.  So  the  old 
social  order  will  be  able  to  renew  itself. 

Psychological  pedagogy  has  an  exalted  an- 
cestry. I  will  not  go  back  to  those  artists  in 
education  called  Socrates  and  Jesus,  but  I 
commence  with  the  modern  world.  In  the 
hours  of  its  sunrise,  in  which  we,  who  look 


The  Education  of  the  Child        79 

back,  think  we  see  a  futile  Renaissance,  then 
as  now  the  spring  flowers  came  up  amid 
the  decaying  foliage.  At  this  period  there 
came  a  demand  for  the  remodelling  of  educa- 
tion through  the  great  figure  of  modern 
times,  Montaigne,  that  skeptic  who  had  so 
deep  a  reverence  for  realities.  In  his 
Essays,  in  his  Letters  to  the  Countess  of 
Gurson,  are  found  all  of  the  elements  for  the 
education  of  the  future.  About  the  great 
German  and  Swiss  specialists  in  pedagogy  and 
psychology,  Comenius,  Basedow,  Pestalozzi, 
Salzmann,  Froebel,  Herbart,  I  do  not  need 
to  speak.  I  will  only  mention  that  the  great- 
est men  of  Germany,  Lessing,  Herder, 
Goethe,  Kant  and  others,  took  the  side  of 
natural  training.  In  regard  to  England  it  is 
well  known  that  John  Locke  in  his  Thoughts 
on  Education,  was  a  worthy  predecessor  of 
Herbert  Spencer,  whose  book  on  education  in 
its  intellectual,  moral,  and  physical  relations, 
was  the  most  noteworthy  book  on  education 
in  the  last  century. 

It  has  been  noted  that  Spencer  in  educa- 
tional theory  is  indebted  to  Rousseau;  and 
that  in  many  cases,  he  has  only  said  what  the 
great  German  authorities,  whom  he  certainly 
did  not  know,  said  before  him.     But  this  does 


8o  The  Century  of  the  Child 

not  diminish  Spencer's  merit  in  the  least.  Ab- 
solutely new  thoughts  are  very  rare.  Truths 
which  were  once  new  must  be  constantly  re- 
newed by  being  pronounced  again  from  the 
depth  of  the  ardent  personal  conviction  of  a 
new  human  being. 

That  rational  thoughts  on  the  subject 
of  pedagogy  as  on  other  subjects,  are  con- 
stantly expressed  and  re-expressed,  shows 
among  other  things  that  reasonable,  or  prac- 
tically untried  education  has  certain  principles 
which  are  as  axiomatic  as  those  of  mathema- 
tics. Every  reasonable  thinking  man  must  as 
certainly  discover  anew  these  pedagogical 
principles,  as  he  must  discover  anew  the  rela- 
tion between  the  angles  of  a  triangle.  Spen- 
cer's book  it  is  true  has  not  laid  again  the 
foundation  of  education.  It  can  rather  be 
called  the  crown  of  the  edifice  founded  by 
Montaigne,  Locke,  Rousseau,  and  the  great 
German  specialists  in  pedagogy.  What  is  an 
absolutely  novel  factor  in  our  times  is  the 
.  study  of  the  psychology  of  the  child,  and  the 
system  of  education  that  has  developed  from 
it. 
^  f  In  England,  through  the  scientist  Darwin, 
;/  this  new  study  of  the  psychology  of  the  child 
'     was  inaugurated.     In  Germany,  Preyer  con- 


The  Education  of  the  Child        8i 

tributed  to  its  extension.  He  has  done  so 
partly  by  a  comprehensive  study  of  child- 
ren's language,  partly  by  collecting  recollec- 
tions of  childhood  on  the  part  of  the  adult. 
Finally  he  experimented  directly  on  the  child, 
investigating  his  physical  and  psychical  fa- 
tigue and  endurance,  acuteness  of  sensation, 
power,  speed,  and  exactness  in  carrying  out 
physical  and  mental  tasks.  He  has  studied 
his  capacity  of  attention  in  emotions  and  in 
ideas  at  different  periods  of  life.  He  has 
studied  the  speech  of  children,  association  of 
ideas  in  children,  etc.  During  the  study  of 
the  psychology  of  the  child,  scholars  began  to 
substitute  for  this  term  the  expression  "  gene- 
tic psychology."  For  it  was  found  that  the 
bio-genetic  principle  was  valid  for  the  develop- 
ment both  of  the  psychic  and  the  physical  life. 
This  principle  means  that  the  history  of  the 
species  is  repeated  in  the  history  of  the  indi- 
vidual; a  truth  substantiated  in  other  spheres; 
in  philology  for  example.  The  psychology  of 
the  child  is  of  the  same  significance  for  gen- 
eral psychology  as  embryology  is  for  anatomy. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  description  of  savage 
peoples,  of  peoples  in  a  natural  condition, 
such  as  we  find  in  Spencer's  Descriptive  So- 
ciology or  Weitz's  Anthropology  is  extremely 

6 


S2  The  Century  of  the  Child 

instructive  for  a  right  conception  of  the  psy- 
chology of  the  child. 

It  is  in  this  kind  of  psychological  investiga- 
tion that  the  greatest  progress  has  been  made 
in  this  century.  In  the  great  publication, 
Zeitschrift  fur  psychologies  etc.,  there  began 
in  1894  a  special  department  for  the  psycho- 
logy of  children  and  the  psychology  of  educa- 
tion. In  1898,  there  were  as  many  as  one 
hundred  and  six  essays  devoted  to  this  sub- 
ject, and  they  are  constantly  increasing. 

In  the  chief  civilised  countries  this  investi- 
gation has  many  distinguished  pioneers,  such 
as  Prof.  Wundt,  Prof.  T.  H.  Ribot,  and 
others.  In  Germany  this  subject  has  its  most 
important  organ  in  the  journal  mentioned 
above.  It  numbers  among  its  collaborators 
some  of  the  most  distinguished  German  phy- 
siologists and  psychologists.  As  related  to 
the  same  subject  must  be  mentioned  Wundt 's 
Philosophisclien  Studien,  and  partly  the  Vier- 
teljahrschrift  fur  WissenscJiaftlichie  Philoso- 
phie.  In  France,  there  was  founded  in  1894, 
the  Annee  Psychologique,  edited  by  Binet  and 
Beaunis,  and  also  the  Bibliotheque  de  Pedago- 
gie  et  de  Psychologies,  edited  by  Binet.  In 
England  there  are  the  journals.  Mind  and 
Brain. 


The  Education  of  the  Child        83 

^  Special  laboratories  for  experimental  psy- 
chology with  psychological  apparatus  and 
methods  of  research  are  found  in  many  places. 
In  Germany  the  first  to  be  founded  was  that 
of  Wundt  in  the  year  1878  at  Leipzig. 
France  has  a  laboratory  for  experimental 
psychology  at  Paris,  in  the  Sorbonne,  whose 
director  is  Binet;  Italy,  one  in  Rome.  In 
America  experimental  psychology  is  zeal- 
ously pursued.  As  early  as  1894,  there  were 
in  that  country  twenty-seven  laboratories  for 
experimental  psychology  and  four  journals. 
There  should  also  be  mentioned  the  societies 
for  child  psychology.  Recently  one  has  been 
founded  in  Germany;  others  before  this  time 
have  been  at  work  in  England  and  America. 

A  whole  series  of  investigations  carried  out 
in  Kraepelin's  laboratory  in  Heidelberg  are 
of  the  greatest  value  for  determining  wliat 
the  brain  can  do  in  the  way  of  work  and 
impressions. 

An  English  specialist  has  maintained  that 
the  future,  thanks  to  the  modern  school  sys- 
tem, wdU  be  able  to  get  along  without  ori- 
ginally creative  men,  because  the  receptive 
activities  of  modern  man  will  absorb  the  co- 
operative powders  of  the  brain  to  the  disadvant- 
age of  the  productive  powers.     And  even  if 


84  The  Century  of  the  Child 

this  were  not  a  universally  valid  statement  but 

ronly  expressed  a  physiological  certainty,  peo- 
ple will  some  day  perhaps  cease  filing  down 
man's  brain  by  that  sandpapering  process 
called  a  school  curriculum. 

A  champion  of  the  transformation  of  peda- 
gogy into  a  psycho-physiological  science  is  to 
be  found  in  Sweden  in  the  person  of  Prof. 
Hjalmar  Oehrwal  who  has  discussed  in  his 
essays  native  and  foreign  discoveries  in  the 
field  of  psychology.  One  of  his  conclusions 
is  that  the  so-called  technical  exercises,  gym- 
nastics, manual  training,  sloyd,  and  the  like, 
are  not,  as  they  are  erroneously  called,  a  relax- 
ation from  mental  overstrain  by  change  in 
work,  but  simply  a  new  form  of  brain  fatigue. 
All  work,  he  finds,  done  under  conditions  of 
fatigue  is  uneconomic  whether  one  regards  the 
quantity  produced  or  its  value  as  an  exercise. 
Rest  should  be  nothing  more  than  rest, — free- 
dom to  do  only  what  one  wants  to,  or  to  do 
nothing  at  all.  As  to  fear,  he  proves,  follow- 
ing Binet's  investigation  in  this  subject,  how 
corporal  discipline,  threats,  and  ridicule  lead 
to  cowardice;  how  all  of  these  methods  are  to 
be  rejected  because  they  are  depressing  and 
tend  to  a  diminution  of  energy.  He  shows, 
moreover,  how  fear  can  be  overcome  progres- 


The  Education  of  the  Child        85 

sively,  by  strengthening  the  nervous  system 
and  in  that  way  strengthening  the  character. 
This  result  comes  about  partly  when  all  un- 
necessary terrorising  is  avoided,  partly  when 
children  are  accustomed  to  bear  calmly  and 
quietly  the  inevitable  unpleasantnesses  of 
danger. 

Prof.  Axel  Key's  investigations  on  school 
children  have  won  international  recognition. 
In  Sweden  they  have  supplied  the  most  sig- 
nificant material  up  to  the  present  time  for 
determining  the  influence  of  studies  on  physi- 
cal development  and  the  results  of  intellectual 
overstrain. 

It  is  to  be  hoped  that  w^hen  through  em- 
pirical investigation  we  begin  to  get  acquainted 
vrith  the  real  nature  of  children,  the  school  and 
the  home  will  be  freed  from  absurd  notions 
about  the  character  and  needs  of  the  child, 
those  absurd  notions  which  now  cause  painful 
cases  of  physical  and  psychical  maltreatment, 
still  called  by  conscientious  and  thinking  hu- 
man beings  in  schools  and  in  homes,  education. 


By  ELLEN  KEY 


Love  and  Marriage 

Cr.  8° 

*'  One  of  the  profoundest  and  most  important  pronouncements  of 
the  woman's  movement  that  has  yet  found  expression.  .  .  .  Intensely 
modern  in  her  attitude.  Miss  Key  has  found  a  place  for  all  the 
conflicting  philosophies  of  the  day,  has  taken  what  is  good  from  each, 
has  affected  the  compromise,  which  is  always  the  road  to  advance- 
ment, between  individualism  and  socialism,  realism  and  idealism, 
morality  and  the  new  thought.  She  is  more  than  a  metaphysical 
philosopher.  She  is  a  seer,  a  prophet.  She  brings  to  her  aid 
psychology,  history,  science,  and  then  something  more — inspiration 
and  hope." — Boston  Transcript. 

The  Woman  Movement 

Translated  by  Mamah  Bouton  Borthwick,  A.M. 
With  an  Introduction  by  Havelock  Ellis 

12° 

This  is  not  a  history  of  the  woman's  movement,  but  a  statement 
of  what  Ellen  Key  considers  to  be  the  new  phase  it  is  now  entering 
on,  a  phase  in  which  the  claim  to  exert  the  rights  and  functions  of 
men  is  less  important  than  the  claims  of  woman's  rights  as  the 
mother  and  educator  of  the  coming  generation. 

Rahel  Vamhagen 

A  Portrait 

Translated  by  Arthur  E.  Chater 
With  an  Introduction  by  Havelock  Ellis 

12°.      With  Portraits 

A  biography  from  original  sources  of  one  who  has  been  described 
as  among  the  first  and  greatest  of  modern  women.  The  book  is  a 
portrait  sketch  of  Rahel  Vamhagen,  and  her  characteristics,  as  "  a 
prophecy  of  the  woman  of  the  future,"  are  illustrated  by  copious 
extracts  from  her  correspondence. 


G.  P.  Putnam*s  Sons 

New  York  London 


By  ELLEN  KEY 


The  Century  of  the  Child 


CONTENTS:  The  Right  of  the  Child  to  Choose  His 
Parents,  The  Unborn  Race  and  Woman's  Work,  Education, 
HomelessTjess,  Soul  Murder  in  the  Schools,  The  School  of 
the  Future,  Religious  Instruction,  Child  Labor  and  the 
Crimes  of  Children.  This  book  has  gone  through  more 
than  twenty  German  Editions  and  has  been  published  in 
several  European  countries. 

••A  powerful  book."— 2\r.  Y.  Times, 

"A  profound  and  analytical  discussion  by  t  great  Scandinavian 
teacher,  o^  the  reasons  why  modem  education  does  not  better 
educate." — N.  Y.  Christian  Herald, 

The  Education  of  the  Child 

Reprinted  from  the  Authorized  American  Edition  of 
The  Century  of  the  Child,  With  Introductory  Note  by 
EDWARD  BOK- 


"Nothing  finer  on  the  wise  education  of  the  child  has  ever  been 
brought  into  print.  To  me  this  chapter  is  a  perfect  classic;  it  points 
the  way  straight  for  e^ery  parent,  and  it  should  find  a  place  in  every 
home  in  America  where  there  is  a  child." — ^EDWARD  BOK,  Editor 
of  the  Ladies'  Home  Journal. 

"This  book,  by  one  of  the  most  thoughtful  students  of  child  life 
among  current  writers,  is  one  that  will  prove  invaluable  to  parents 
who  desire  to  develop  in  their  children  that  strength  of  character, 
self-control  and  personality  that  alone  makes  for  a  well-rounded  nse* 
fol  and  happy  \iie,**-— Baltimore  Sun. 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  Ionian 


The 

Book  of  the  Stars 
for  Young  People 

By  William  Tyler  Olcott 


Mr.  Olcott,  whose  Field  Book  of  the  Stars  has 
long  been  an  accepted  authority  and  a  con- 
venient handbook,  here  presents  a  much  needed 
volume  for  beginners  in  the  fascinating  study 
of  the  stars.  In  an  easy  conversational  style 
which  older  children  will  readily  understand, 
he  explains  the  positions  of  the  various  constel- 
lations and  tells  the  quaint  legends  and  stories 
which  from  time  immemorial  have  characterized 
the  stars  and  their  constellations. 

Only  what  can  be  observed  with  the  naked  eye 
or  with  an  opera  glass  has  been  included.  In  this 
Mr.  Olcott  has  followed  the  general  plan  of  his 
Field  Book.  The  simplicity  and  accuracy  of  its 
manner  will  recommend  the  book  not  only  to 
young  people  themselves,  but  also  to  parents  who 
have  wished  a  guide  to  assist  them  in  teaching 
clearly  to  their  children  the  elementary  facts 
about  the  stars  and  star  lore. 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


The 

Book  of  Wild  Flowers 
for  Young  People 

By  f.  Schuyler  Mathews 

Mr.  Mathews  is  a  sympathetic  natural- 
ist himself,  and  his  children's  nature  books, 
even  though  completely  accurate,  are 
written  so  simply  that  they  cannot  fail  to 
stimulate  a  youngster's  ever-present  curi- 
osity about  the  out-of-doors.  The  color 
illustrations  are  not  only  beautiful  but 
authentic,  and  admirably  calculated  to 
instil  a  love  of  flowers  in  many  a  child's 
impressionable  mind. 

G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New  York  London 


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